LOWRY: When we're talking about extremism, and you're going to do a survey highlighting the extremism of the other side, when you're working on a book called American Taliban, which - in your own words - catalogs the ways in which modern-day conservatives share the same agenda as radical jihadists in the Islamic world - I mean, who's the extremist here?  That is obviously a ridiculous [sic] --  . . . . So you agree Kos is an extremist . . . . In my mind, only an extremist says:  the other side in the American political discussion, shares the same agenda as radical jihadidsts. 

COX:  OK, that's pretty extreme.

Does Rich Lowry know that the most promoted writers at his magazine have published books like these, along with these self-descriptions:

"In this provocative and well-researched book, Goldberg probes modern liberalism's spooky origins in early 20th-century fascist politics. With chapter titles such as Adolf Hitler: Man of the Left and Brave New Village: Hillary Clinton and the Meaning of Liberal Fascism -- Goldberg argues that fascism has always been a phenomenon of the left."

"Is the Democratic Party the 'Party of Death'? If you look at their agenda they are. IT’S NOT JUST abortion-on-demand. It’s euthanasia, embryo destruction, even infanticide—and a potentially deadly concern with 'the quality of life' of disabled people. If you think these issues don’t concern you—guess again. The Party of Death could be roaring into the White House, as National Review senior editor Ramesh Ponnuru shows, in the person of Hillary Rodham Clinton."

"This diligently documented book shows that neither the internment of ethnic Japanese--not to mention ethnic Germans and Italians--nor the relocation and evacuation of Japanese Americans from the West Coast were the result of war hysteria or race prejudice as historians have taught us."

And that's to say nothing of the various books of Ann Coulter -- whom Lowry denied was an extremist while allowing that "she's said some extreme things" -- which have called liberals Godless Traitors and the like.

I know it's not news that Rich Lowry is an intellectually dishonest hack.  And I also know it's not news that the brain of right-wing authoritarians allows its host to blithely accuse others of exactly that which they do.  Still, as common as it is, there are times when I'm amazed at how compartmentalized and self-blinding the human brain can be. 

Shouldn't a normally functioning brain send a signal to Lowry along the lines of:  "You can't complain that it makes someone an 'extremist' to compare 'the other side in the American political discussion' to Islamic radicals because one of your magazine's Senior Editors just recently wrote a book comparing liberals to Nazis, and another one of them wrote a book calling them the Party of Death?  Forget intellectual honesty; just as a strategic matter, in order not to expose yourself as a wildly dishonest and hypocritical polemicist, shouldn't the brain intervene and at least tell the person that they should alter their criticisms so it's not blatantly attacking exactly what their closest comrades do?  Yet somehow, the brain never sends that signal -- or it never gets received -- and people like Rich Lowry can sit there with a straight face and attack someone for doing exactly that which his own writers do, without any apparent recognition of that fact at all.  If nothing else, it's a wonder to behold as a biological and psychological phenomenon.

* * * * *

Two unrelated points:

(1)  I was on Democracy Now this morning, along with Rep. Dennis Kucinich, discussing the Executive Branch's assassination program aimed at U.S. citizens, as well as the Citizens United decision.  Those two segments can be viewed here (the assassination one is first, and the Citizens United discussion is second):

 

I'll also be on The Young Turks later this week discussing Citizens United with Law Professor Larry Lessig, who wrote this thoughtful critique of the arguments I made.

 

(2) Several months ago, the excellent Obama Pentagon aide in charge of detention policy -- former Army Capt. Philip Carter -- abruptly resigned shortly after the administration announced it would indefinitely detain many Guantanamo detainees and send others to military commissions:  policies which Capt. Carter long opposed when embraced by Bush (though it's unclear whether there was a causal connection between those policies and his resignation).  As Spencer Ackerman reports today, the administration has now replaced Capt. Carter:  with Col. William Lietzau, who -- as Ackerman put it -- "previously served as a special adviser to Jim Haynes, the top Pentagon lawyer during Donald H. Rumsfeld’s tenure, when Rumsfeld and Haynes codified torture and indefinite detention as hallmarks of Bush-era terrorism policy" (h/t Jim White).  Given that Obama's top "terrorism adviser" was a Bush-era CIA official who cheered for various torture and rendition policies, and given that Obama detention policies are so closely modeled after the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld approach (indefinite detention, military commissions, denial of habeas corpus, renditions), this is both an unsurprising and an appropriate choice for that position.

Bush officials who helped design the torture and detention regime aren't prosecuted or even held accountable under Obama.  Instead, they're hired, empowered, relied upon and promoted.

 

UPDATE: For those interested, Sadly No's HTML Mencken comprehensively chronicled Lowry's extremism here and here.  The latter post contains not only his defense of Ann "not-an-extremist" Coulter ("A spectacularly successful author, Ann Coulter is not crazy, although her argumentative brilliance can be tinged with intemperance"), but also his truly disturbed rants on masculinity, Regular Guys and war.

 

UPDATE II: Lowry:  "In my mind, only an extremist says: the other side in the American political discussion, shares the same agenda as radical jihadists."

Fox News/John Ensign:

Liz Cheney:

That's all totally different (h/t Pete B).

 

UPDATE III: Shame on me for forgetting this non-extremist gem from long-time National Review writer Dinesh D'Souza (h/t antrastan):

I wonder in which part of Rich Lowry's mind the recollection of these books is stored?  Or are they just deleted altogether?   Or is it that anyone on the Right is inherently non-extremist no matter how perfectly they adhere to his definition of "extremism"?

 

UPDATE IV:  On October 17, 2007, Thomas Smith, writing in National Review, approvingly quoted Whalid Phares, explaining that anti-war liberals have formed an alliance with radical Islam to destroy the U.S.:  "the Reds (neo-Left) and the Dark Greens (Islamists) are conducting a joint offensive against both democracy-pushing America and the democracy-craving Middle East [...] the so-called "mass demonstrations" in the West since 2002 [...] are an important component of the War of Ideas against democracy" (h/t sysprog).  In the April 16, 2009 edition of National Review, Cliff May explored what he called the "the burgeoning Left-Islamist alliance," an "unholy alliance" between Leftists and Islamic Radicals (h/t Chris Sinnard).

Have I mentioned yet that that magazine's Editor-in-Chief, Rich Lowry, believes that "only an extremist says: the other side in the American political discussion, shares the same agenda as radical jihadidsts"?

 

UPDATE V:  Rich Lowry -- who think it's terribly wrong and extremist to compare one's American political opponents to evil foriegners -- said the following about Jonah Goldberg's book, which compared American Liberals to Nazis:  it's a "brilliant new book" and:  "Let me join those who have been praising Jonah's book, which I wrote about today. It is extraordinarily impressive, both deeply researched and wonderfully written."  About Ramesh Ponnuru's book branding Democrats "The Party of Death," Lowry wrote:  "Let me join those who have praised Ramesh's new book. I read it about a month ago and was blown away by it. It will be a classic. I defy anyone to read it and not come away illuminated. This is polemical writing at its very best -- brilliant, fair-minded, and ultimately absolutely devastating."

Republicans are rushing to capitalize on what they call Wall Street’s "buyer’s remorse" with the Democrats. And industry executives and lobbyists are warning Democrats that if Mr. Obama keeps attacking Wall Street "fat cats," they may fight back by withholding their cash.

"If the president doesn’t become a little more balanced and centrist in his approach, then he will likely lose that support," said Kelly S. King, the chairman and chief executive of BB&T. Mr. King is a board member of the Financial Services Roundtable, which lobbies for the biggest banks, and last month he helped represent the industry at a private dinner at the Treasury Department.

"I understand the public outcry," he continued. "We have a 17 percent real unemployment rate, people are hurting, and they want to see punishment. But the political rhetoric just incites more animosity and gets people riled up" . . . "If the president wanted to turn every Democrat on Wall Street into a Republican," one industry lobbyist said, "he is doing everything right."

There are numerous points to note about all of this.  First, there simply is no more odious faction inside the U.S. than Wall Street bankers -- and that's saying quite a bit.  Just over a year ago, they almost caused a complete global economic collapse -- and did cause extreme economic suffering around the world which continues to this day -- with their sleazy, piggish and lawless behavior.  Yet barely a year later, they now turn around and threaten their purchased politicians with punishment if their behavior is meaningfully restricted or even if they're publicly criticized.  In light of what they did -- and are still doing -- they should consider themselves lucky that the public hasn't stormed their homes and offices in mass rage.  Far less pernicious behavior has triggered such uprisings in the past, and if the American public hadn't been as ingrained with the passivity and learned helplessness they've been trained to accept, one would certainly have seen some of that.  In a rational, democratically engaged society, multi-million dollar taxpayer-enabled banker bonuses, combined with mass unemployment and home foreclosures (combined with establishment threats to reduce Social Security and Medicare), is not the ideal means for maintaining social order.

Second, stories like this ought to put to rest forever the notion that the Republican Party is some sort of haven for populist anger.  As subservient as the Democrats have been to Wall Street -- note that, more than a year later, Wall Street can only complain about "rhetoric," not any actual legislation that has been passed -- the Republicans are out there promising Wall Street to be even more loyal servants if they're given the dog treats that have recently been going to the Democrats:  

Senator John Cornyn of Texas, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said he visited New York about twice a month to try to tap into Wall Street’s "buyers’ remorse." "I just don’t know how long you can expect people to contribute money to a political party whose main plank of their platform is to punish you," Mr. Cornyn said.

So the GOP is out there successfully pretending in front of the angry tea partiers that they, too, are furious about Wall Street's gorging and domination of Washington, all while simultaneously crawling to Wall Street and pledging to be good little boys and girls -- and to keep the agitated masses at bay -- if Wall Street once again purchases them rather than the Democrats.  The only thing more absurd than the Democrats' pretending to be the Populist Party of the People is the Republican Party's doing so.

Third, that Wall Street is dissatisfied with the Democrats and the Obama administration reveals how extreme are their expectations of control of the Government.  The second-highest-ranking Democratic Senator, Dick Durbin, recently conceded of the Democratic-controlled Congress:  "frankly, bankers own the place."  It's impossible to find a more loyal and attentive servant to bankers than Obama Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner.  As the NYT article this morning details, Wall Street executives and their lobbyists have virtually unfettered access to the administration and to the President himself.  You would think they'd be satisfied with the state of affairs in Washington.  Yet so extreme are their perceived entitlements of control that even mere symbolic and rhetorical disobedience from the politicians they own -- he said some mean things about us -- creates a sense of righteous grievance:  our government employees do not behave this way toward us and will be punished if it continues.

Finally, marvel at the cowardice, as well as the journalistic shoddiness, evident in these anonymity-based passages:

The expectation in Washington is that "We can kick you around, and you are still going to give us money," said a top official at a major Wall Street firm, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of alienating the White House. "We are not going to play that game anymore." . . .

"If the president wanted to turn every Democrat on Wall Street into a Republican," one industry lobbyist said, "he is doing everything right."

In essence, Wall Street executives said to David Kirkpatrick, the NYT reporter who wrote this story:  "I want to threaten and criticize the President, but I'm too much of a coward to do so with my name attached, so will you let me do it in your paper anonymously"?  And Kirkpatrick replied:  "Oh, absolutely; that's what anonymity is for:  to let the country's most powerful people spew venom and issue threats while being shielded and protected by journalists from accountability."  Perhaps one of those nameless executives might have inquired of Kirkpatrick:  "but didn't your newspaper publish very stringent guidelines limiting the use of anonymity in the wake of the Iraq debacle?", to which Kirkpatrick could easily and truthfully have replied:  "oh, those?  Please.  Nobody worries about that, least of all us.  That's just there to placate the same angry rabble whom you're now ordering your political property to more efficiently pacify."

The Washington Post, yesterday, on Sarah Palin's Tea Party speech:

[Palin] had on three opera-length strands of pearls, two white and one multi-colored.  [O]n her lapel, a small pin with two flags -- for Israel and the United States.

In its adulating report on Palin's speech, National Review -- whose Rich Lowry and Jonah Goldberg both bitterly complained about the waving of Mexican flags on U.S. soil -- also proudly noted:  "On her lapel, Palin wore a small pin with two flags -- for Israel and the United States."  Along with the fact that she remains deeply unpopular with most Jewish-American voters, Palin's flamboyant display of her so-called love for Israel -- she previously boasted that the Israeli flag was the "only" one she kept in her Gubernatorial office -- is almost certainly grounded in her creepy desire to mold America's foreign policy to fit her evangelical belief that God demands that "Israeli land" be unified under Israeli control in order for Jesus to return and sweep all the good Christians up to heaven in Rapture (while banishing everyone else -- including the Jews she loves so much -- straight to hell forever).  That's one major reason why neocons such as Bill Kristol love her.  Led by Joe Lieberman, neocons have repeatedly shown their willingness to cynically exploit extremist Christian Rapture dogma for greater American fealty towards Israeli actions, and Palin reliably spouts neoconservative dogma on virtually every issue.  Almost every one of her national security pronouncements sounds exactly like Dick Cheney and The Weekly Standard (though her call for expanded Israeli settlements go beyond what even most neocons are willing to advocate openly).  

Is there any other nation in the world where a leading politician can appear in public -- without controversy -- wearing the flag of a foreign country?  It was a huge scandal on the Right when immigration reform marchers waved Mexican (along with American) flags in order to display cultural solidarity with Mexican immigrants who were being demonized and living in wretched conditions, as non-persons, in the U.S.; isn't it obviously more significant when someone who recently wanted to be Vice President and is now the leader of this Fox-News-sponsored political movement appears at events in the U.S. wearing an Israeli flag melded to an American flag, as though the two nations are joined as one entity?  Why should an American political leader be wearing an Israeli flag?

All of this underscores both (a) the total incoherence of the "tea party movement" and (b) how it is, at bottom, nothing more than a cynical marketing attempt to re-brand the right wing of the Republican Party under the exact same policies and principles which defined it for the last couple of decades.  As I've noted before, there are many individual participants in this "tea party movement" with valid populist grievances against the sleaze and corruption of both parties in Washington, but it's all being directed towards a pedestrian goal that has nothing to do with any of those sentiments:  namely, the re-empowerment of the Republican Party in completely unchanged form.  Palin last night righteously condemned the Wall Street bailout even though she (like Glenn Beck) supported that bailout.  She wears the banner of "freedom" and "individual liberty" even as she mocks the notion that our laws and Constitution -- the instruments by which we restrain government power -- ought to limit what the President can do in the name of national security; cheers for the omnipotent Surveillance State; and demands that her religious beliefs form the basis of government intervention in people's lives.  She rails against government debt while supporting the policies largely responsible for its explosion:  namely, limitless increases in military spending and endlessly expanded wars and imperial policies (primarily in the Middle East and oh-so-coincidentally aimed at Muslims). 

In sum, Sarah Palin loyally supports virtually every policy that defined the uniquely disastrous Bush/Cheney first term.  The "tea party movement" depicts itself as some sort of novel and independent force in American politics, and the establishment media -- which patronizingly equates far right extremists with "real Americans" and is petrified of accusations of "liberal bias" -- plays along.  But exactly the opposite is true.  It's just an appendage of the Republican Party:  more dogmatic and boisterous than party leaders would like, but nonetheless devoted to the purest of partisan goals of restoring the same GOP to power that ran the country into the ground over the last decade.  All of the GOP leaders whom this movement seeks to empower are the same ones who subserviently supported almost every Bush/Cheney policy for eight straight years.  As is true for Palin, Fox News is this movement's primary sponsor because Fox, which craves a return of the Bush years, knows that the "tea party movement" will promote that goal by re-imaging the destroyed GOP brand into something fresh, pretty and new.  Hardened GOP loyalists like Rush Limbaugh, Bill Kristol, National Review and Sean Hannity are perfectly at home in the "tea party movement" because its principal effect is to empower the standard right-wing GOP politicians and policies they've long craved.

George Bush and Dick Cheney are too widely discredited for anyone trying to appeal to the unconverted to praise their rule directly.  The GOP needed new packaging, a new face.  The "tea party" movement is just a respectable way for love of GOP dogma to once again be safely expressed: 

In a bid to advance the tea party movement from holding rallies to holding office, the leaders of the anti-establishment groups announced a new political organization Friday that they say will "endorse, support and elect" conservatives across the country.

Mark Skoda, chairman of The Memphis TEA Party, made the announcement at a news conference in the middle of the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville. . . .The announcement came with an official platform that could help define what the multi-faceted tea party movement stands for and expects from the candidates it supports. The group's leaders plan to support candidates who stand for a set of "First Principles."

Those principles are: fiscal responsibility, lower taxes, less government, states' rights and national security. Prospective political candidates will be expected to support the Republican National Committee platform. If a particular candidate meets the proposed criteria he or she would be eligible for fund-raising and grassroots support.

Though it's not true for all of its supporters, the "tea party movement" itself is just a Republican movement -- the standard-issue type that blindly cheered Bush and Cheney.  It's all the same nationalistic militarism and warmongering, Wall Street-subservient economics, and religion-based policy-making that has defined the GOP forever.  There's nothing new here.  If anything, it represents a demand for even greater allegiance to the Bush/Cheney mindset, for a more purist and even less restrained version of the national security insanity, civil liberties assaults, massive increases in the rich-poor gap, control of Americans' lives through "social issues," and endless wars which the Republican Party has long rhetorically claimed to embody.  Other than a Medicare prescription plan here and an immigration reform plan there, from what Bush/Cheney orthodoxies do they dissent?  None.

This movement is nothing more than the Republican Party masquerading as a grass-roots phenomenon.  In 2000, the GOP found a cowboy-hat-wearing, swaggering, "likable" Regular Guy spouting "compassion" in domestic policy and "humility" in foreign policy to re-brand itself in the wake of the Gingrich-led branding disaster.  Sarah Palin and the "tea party movement" are just the updated versions of that, the re-branding in the wake of the Bush/Cheney-led image disaster.  They're every bit as extremist, radical and dangerous as the last decade revealed standard right-wing Republicans to be, but the one thing they're not is new or innovative.

 

UPDATE:  The Nashville Post's A.C. Kleinheider, who covered the Tea Party convention for that paper, says Sarah Palin killed the tea party movement ("The tea party movement is dead. The one I was familiar with anyway. Judson Phillips held it down and Sarah Palin drove a stake right through its heart live last night on C-Span in front of an unsuspecting audience").  He also observes that "Sarah Palin didn’t give a tea party speech last night. She gave a partisan Republican address"; he asks:  "what was [Palin] doing justifying and perpetuating the foreign policy of George Bush at a tea party convention?"; and says that what began as "an authentic protest movement" -- "of ragtag and unorganized libertarians, independents and conservatives [that] was something new and unique" -- has now been completely annexed by Palin and her GOP operative-controllers who want a  restoration of the standard Bush/Cheney agenda.

I think it was clear from the start that the populist and anti-Beltway rage fueling these gatherings was being diverted (absurdly) into standard Republican dogma, by the same party that ran the country with virtually no restraints for the last decade.  And a large faction of this movement from the beginning was driven by the same ugly nationalism, Christian fanaticism, and Limbaughian hatreds that have long shaped the American GOP Right.  There's a reason why the Bush-revering Fox News embraced it from the beginning.  But whatever else is true -- whatever authentic elements once existed here -- it is now nothing more than a vehicle for rejuvenating the standard GOP, draped with even more neoconservative extremism and religious fervor than drove it for the last ten years. That's why Sarah Palin is their most beloved leader.

All throughout the Bush years, no matter what one objected to -- illegal eavesdropping, torture, rendition, indefinite detention, denial of civilian trials -- the response from Bush followers was the same:  "But these are Terrorists, and Terrorists have no rights, so who cares what is done to them?"  What they actually meant was:  "the Government has claimed they are Terrorists," but in their minds, that was the same thing as:  "they are Terrorists."  They recognized no distinction between "a government accusation" and "unchallengeable truth"; in the authoritarian's mind, by definition, those are synonymous.  The whole point of the Bush-era controversies was that -- away from an actual battlefield and where the Constitution applies (on U.S. soil and/or towards American citizens wherever they are) -- the Government should have to demonstrate someone's guilt before it's assumed (e.g., they should have to show probable cause to a court and obtain warrants before eavesdropping; they should have to offer evidence that a person engaged in Terrorism before locking them in a cage, etc.).  But to someone who equates unproven government accusations with proof, those processes are entirely unnecessary.  Even in the absence of those processes, they already know that these persons are Terrorists.  How do they know that?  Because the Government said so.  Even when it comes to their fellow citizens, that's all the "proof" that is needed.

That authoritarian mentality is stronger than ever now.  Why?  Because unlike during the Bush years, when it was primarily Republicans willing to blindly trust Government accusations, many Democrats are now willing to do so as well.  Just look at the reaction to the Government's recent attempts to assassinate the U.S.-born American citizen and Islamic cleric Anwar al-Awlaki.  Up until last November, virtually no Americans had ever even heard of al-Awlaki.  But in the past few months, beginning with the Fort Hood shootings, government officials have repeatedly claimed that he's a Terrorist:  usually anonymously, with virtually no evidence, and in the face of al-Awlaki's vehement denials but without any opportunity for him to defend himself (because he's in hiding out of fear of being killed by his own Government).  The Government can literally just flash someone's face on the TV screen with the word Terrorist over it (as was done with al-Awlaki), and provided the face is nefarious and Muslim-looking enough (basically the same thing), nothing else need be offered.

That's enough for many people -- including many Democrats -- to march forward overnight and mindlessly proclaim that al-Awlaki is "a declared enemy of the United States working to kill Americans" (if you can stomach it, read some of these comments -- from Obama defenders at a liberal blog -- with several sounding exactly like Dick Cheney, screeching:  "Of course al-Awlaki should be killed without charges; he's a Terrorist who is trying to kill Americans!!!").  Even now, beyond government assertions about his associations, the public knows virtually nothing about al-Awlaki other than the fact that he's a Muslim cleric with a Muslim name dressed in Muslim garb, sitting in a Bad Arab Country expressing anger towards the actions of the U.S. and Israel.  But no matter.  That's more than enough.  They're willing not only to mindlessly embrace the Government's unproven accusation that their fellow citizen is a TERRORIST ("a declared enemy of the United States working to kill Americans"), but even beyond that, to cheer for his due-process-free execution like drunken fans at a football game.  And the same people declare:  no civilian trials are necessary for Terrorists (meaning:  people accused by the Government of being Terrorists).  Even more amazingly, the identities of the other Americans on the hit list aren't even known, but that's OK:  they're Terrorists, because the Government said so.

A very long time ago, I would be baffled when I'd read about things like the Salem witch hunts.  How could so many people be collectively worked up into that level of irrational frenzy, where they cheered for people's torturous death as "witches" without any real due process or meaningful evidence?  But all one has to do is look at our current Terrorism debates and it's easy to see how things like that happen.  It's just pure mob mentality:  an authority figure appears and affixes a demonizing Other label to someone's forehead, and the adoring crowd -- frothing-at-the-mouth and feeding on each other's hatred, fears and desire to be lead -- demands "justice."  I imagine that if one could travel back in time to the Salem era in order to speak with some of those gathered outside an accused witch's home, screaming for her to be killed, the conversation would go something like this:

Mob Participant:  Hang the Witch!!!  Kill her!!!

Far Left Civil Liberties Extremist-Purist ("FLCLE-P"):  How do you know she's a witch?

Mob Participant:  Didn't you just hear the government official say so?

FLCLE-P:  But don't you want to see real evidence before you assume that's true and call for her death?

Mob Participant:  You just heard the evidence!  The magistrate said she's a witch!

FLCLE-P:  But shouldn't there be a real trial first, with tangible evidence and due process protections, to see if the accusation is actually true?

Mob Participant:  A "real" trial?  She's a witch!  She's trying to curse us and kill us all.  She got more than what she deserved.  Witches don't have rights!!!

Return to Question 1.

That's essentially how I hear our debates over Terrorism, and how I've heard them for quite some time.  And it's how I hear them more loudly now than ever before.  And with those deeply confused premises now locked into place on a bipartisan basis ("no trials are needed to determine if someone is a Terrorist because Terrorists don't have rights"), imagine how much louder that will get if there is another successful terrorist attack in the U.S.  But in fairness to the 17th Century Puritans, at least the Salem witches received pretenses of due process and even trials (albeit with coerced confessions and speculative hearsay).  Even when it comes to our fellow citizens, we don't even bother with those.  For us, the mere accusation by our leaders is sufficient:  Kill that American Terrorist with a drone!

 

UPDATE:  A long-time, regular commenter here, Jestaplero, is a state prosecutor in New York, and he explains -- in this comment -- how the mentality discussed here can and does easily expand beyond the realm of Terrorism.

Interestingly, even Allahpundit at Michelle Malkin's Hot Air recognizes the serious dangers in allowing the Government to decree even U.S. citizens to be "Terrorists" and then treat them accordingly, with no due process.  But note how his right-wing commenters are almost exclusively of the "just-kill-him" school of thought, and how identical they sound to that minority of Daily Kos commenters I linked above who, in their blind loyalty to Obama, also insist that there's nothing wrong with simply snuffing out the lives of their fellow citizens who are "Terrorists" (meaning:  anyone their Leader claims is a Terrorist) with no due process or oversight whatsoever.  Ultimately, authoritarians are authoritarians, regardless of whether they situate themselves on the left or right.

The U.S. intelligence community policy on killing American citizens who have joined al Qaeda requires first obtaining high-level government approval, a senior official disclosed to Congress on Wednesday.

Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair said in each case a decision to use lethal force against a U.S. citizen must get special permission. . . .

He also said there are criteria that must be met to authorize the killing of a U.S. citizen that include "whether that American is involved in a group that is trying to attack us, whether that American is a threat to other Americans. Those are the factors involved."

Although Blair emphasized that it requires "special permission" before an American citizen can be placed on the assassination list, consider from whom that "permission" is obtained:  the President, or someone else under his authority within the Executive Branch.  There are no outside checks or limits at all on how these "factors" are weighed.  In last week's post, I wrote about all the reasons why it's so dangerous -- as well as both legally and Consitutionally dubious -- to allow the President to kill American citizens not on an active battlefield during combat, but while they are sleeping, sitting with their families in their home, walking on the street, etc.  That's basically giving the President the power to impose death sentences on his own citizens without any charges or trial.  Who could possibly support that?

But even if you're someone who does want the President to have the power to order American citizens killed without a trial by decreeing that they are Terrorists (and it's worth remembering that if you advocate that power, it's going to be vested in all Presidents, not just the ones who are as Nice, Good, Kind-Hearted and Trustworthy as Barack Obama), shouldn't there at least be some judicial approval required?  Do we really want the President to be able to make this decision unilaterally and without outside checks?  Remember when many Democrats were horrified (or at least when they purported to be) at the idea that Bush was merely eavesdropping on American citizens without judicial approval?  Shouldn't we be at least as concerned about the President's being able to assassinate Americans without judicial oversight?  That seems much more Draconian to me. 

It would be perverse in the extreme, but wouldn't it be preferable to at least require the President to demonstrate to a court that probable cause exists to warrant the assassination of an American citizen before the President should be allowed to order it?  That would basically mean that courts would issue "assassination warrants" or "murder warrants" -- a repugnant idea given that they're tantamount to imposing the death sentence without a trial -- but isn't that minimal safeguard preferable to allowing the President unchecked authority to do it on his own, the very power he has now claimed for himself?  And if the Fifth Amendment's explicit guarantee -- that one shall not be deprived of life without due process -- does not prohibit the U.S. Government from assassinating you without any process, what exactly does it prohibit?  Noting Scott Brown's campaign to deny accused Terrorists access to lawyers and a real trial, Adam Serwer wrote:  

This is the new normal for Republicans: You can be denied rights not through due process of law but merely based on the nature of the crime you are suspected of committing.

That's absolutely true, but that also perfectly describes this assassination program -- as well as a whole host of other now-Democratic policies, from indefinite detention to denial of civilian trials.

* * * * *

The severe dangers of vesting assassination powers in the President are so glaring that even GOP Rep. Pete Hoekstra is able to see them (at least he is now that there's a Democratic President).  At yesterday's hearing, Hoekstra asked Adm. Blair about the threat that the President might order Americans killed due to their Constitutionally protected political speech rather than because they were actually engaged in Terrorism.  This concern is not an abstract one.  The current controversy has been triggered by the Obama administration's attempt to kill U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen.  But al-Awlaki has not been accused (let alone convicted) of trying to attack Americans.  Instead, he's accused of being a so-called "radical cleric" who supports Al Qaeda and now provides "encouragement" to others to engage in attacks --  a charge al-Awlaki's family vehemently denies (al-Awlaki himself is in hiding due to fear that his own Government will assassinate him).

The question of where First Amendment-protected radical advocacy ends and criminality begins is exactly the sort of question with which courts have long grappled.  In the 1969 case of Brandenburg v. Ohio, the Supreme Court unanimously reversed a criminal conviction of a Ku Klux Klan leader who -- surrounded by hooded indivduals holding weapons -- gave a speech threatening "revengeance" against any government official who "continues to suppress the white, Caucasian race."  The Court held that the First Amendment protects advocacy of violence and revolution, and that the State is barred from punishing citizens for the expression of such views.  The Brandenburg Court pointed to a long history of precedent protecting the First Amendment rights of Communists to call for revolution -- even violent revolution -- inside the U.S., and explained that the Government can punish someone for violent actions but not for speech that merely advocates or justifies violence (emphasis added):

As we [395 U.S. 444, 448] said in Noto v. United States, 367 U.S. 290, 297 -298 (1961), "the mere abstract teaching . . . of the moral propriety or even moral necessity for a resort to force and violence, is not the same as preparing a group for violent action and steeling it to such action." See also Herndon v. Lowry, 301 U.S. 242, 259 -261 (1937); Bond v. Floyd, 385 U.S. 116, 134 (1966). A statute which fails to draw this distinction impermissibly intrudes upon the freedoms guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth Amendments. It sweeps within its condemnation speech which our Constitution has immunized from governmental control.

From all appearances, al-Awlaki seems to believe that violence by Muslims against the U.S. is justified in retaliation for the violence the U.S. has long brought (and continues to bring) to the Muslim world.  But as an American citizen, he has the absolute Constitutional right to express those views and not be punished for them (let alone killed) no matter where he is in the world; it's far from clear that he has transgressed the advocacy line into violent action.  Obviously, there are those who justify such assassination powers on the ground that radical Islam is a grave threat, but that is what is always said to justify Constitutional abridgements (it was obviously said of Communists and war critics during World War I).  Indeed, in light of episodes like the Timothy McVeigh bombing and the various attacks on abortion clinics, shouldn't those who want the President to be able to assassinate American "radical clerics" without a trial also support the President's targeting of Americans who advocate extremism or violence from a far right or extremist Christian perspective?  What's the principle that allows one but not the other?

In response to these concerns, Admiral Blair said yesterday:  "We don't target people for free speech. We target them for taking action that threatens Americans or has resulted in it."  But the U.S. Government -- like all governments -- has a long history of viewing "free speech" as a violent threat or even Terrorism.  That's why this is exactly the type of question that is typically -- and is intended to be -- resolved by courts, according the citizen due process, not by the President acting alone.  That's especially true if the death penalty is to be imposed.  

But Obama's presidential assassination policy completely short-circuits that process.  It literally makes Barack Obama the judge, jury and executioner even of American citizens. Beyond its specific application, it is yet another step -- a rather major one -- towards abandoning our basic system of checks and balances in the name of Terrorism and War.

* * * * * 

That last point is the most important one here.  Atrios wrote the other day that a central prong in the Washington consensus is that "all it takes to nullify the constitution is to call someone a terraist."  That's absolutely true, but a close corollary is that merely uttering the word "war" justifies the same thing.  That's particularly dangerous given that, by all accounts, this is a so-called "war" that will not end for a generation, if ever.  To justify the abridgment or even suspension of the Constitution on the ground of "war" is to advocate serious alterations to our Constitutional framework that are more or less permanent.  Several points about that "war" excuse: 

First, there's no "war exception" in the Constitution.  Even with real wars -- i.e., those involving combat between opposing armies -- the Constitution actually continues to constrain what government officials can do, most stringently as it concerns U.S. citizens.  Second, strictly speaking, we're not really "at war," as Congress has merely authorized the use of military force but has not formally or Constitutionally declared war.  Even the Bush administration conceded that this is a vital difference when it comes to legal rights.  In 2006, the Bush DOJ insisted that the wartime provision of FISA -- allowing the Government to eavesdrop for up to 15 days without a warrant -- didn't apply because Congress only enacted an AUMF, not a declaration of war (click image to enlarge):

The Bush DOJ went on to explain that declarations of war trigger a whole variety of legal effects (such as terminating diplomatic relations and abrogating or suspending treaty obligations) which AUMFs do not trigger (see p. 27).  To authorize military force is not to declare war.  Finally, the U.S. is fighting numerous undeclared wars, including ones involving military action:  given that our "War on Drugs" continues to rage, should the U.S. Government be able to target accused "drug kingpins" for assassination without a trial, the way we attempted to do in Afghanistan?  After all, Terrorists blow up airplanes but Drug Kingpins kill our kids!!!  The mindset that cheers for unlimited Presidential powers in the name of "war" invariably leads to exactly these sorts of expansions.

Far beyond the specific injustices of assassinating Americans without trials, the real significance, the real danger, is that we continue to be frightened into radically altering our system of government.  In Slate yesterday, Dahlia Lithwick encapsulated this problem perfectly; her whole article should be read, but this excerpt is superb:

America has slid back again into its own special brand of terrorism-derangement syndrome. Each time this condition recurs, it presents with more acute and puzzling symptoms. . . .

Moreover, each time Republicans go to their terrorism crazy-place, they go just a little bit farther than they did the last time, so that things that made us feel safe last year make us feel vulnerable today. . . . In short, what was once tough on terror is now soft on terror. And each time the Republicans move their own crazy-place goal posts, the Obama administration moves right along with them. . . .

We're terrified when a terror attack happens, and we're also terrified when it's thwarted. We're terrified when we give terrorists trials, and we're terrified when we warehouse them at Guantanamo without trials. If a terrorist cooperates without being tortured we complain about how much more he would have cooperated if he hadn't been read his rights. No matter how tough we've been on terror, we will never feel safe enough to ask for fewer safeguards. . . .

But here's the paradox: It's not a terrorist's time bomb that's ticking. It's us. Since 9/11, we have become ever more willing to suspend basic protections and more contemptuous of American traditions and institutions. The failed Christmas bombing and its political aftermath have revealed that the terrorists have changed very little in the eight-plus years since the World Trade Center fell. What's changing -- what's slowly ticking its way down to zero -- is our own certainty that we can never be safe enough and our own confidence in the rule of law.

This descent has certainly not reversed itself -- it has not really even slowed -- with the election of a President who repeatedly vowed to reject this mentality.  Just consider what Al Gore said in his truly excellent 2006 speech decrying the "Constitutional crisis" under the Bush presidency:

Can it be true that any president really has such powers under our Constitution?

If the answer is yes, then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited?

If the president has the inherent authority to eavesdrop on American citizens without a warrant, imprison American citizens on his own declaration, kidnap and torture, then what can't he do?

Here we are, almost four years later with a new party in power, and the President's top intelligence official announces -- without any real controversy -- that the President claims the power to assassinate American citizens with no charges, no trials, no judicial oversight of any kind.  The claimed power isn't "inherent" -- it's based on alleged Congressional approval -- but it's safeguard-free and due-process-free just the same.  As Gore asked of less severe policies in 2006, if the President can do that, "then what can't he do?"  As long as we stay petrified of the Terrorists and wholly submissive whenever the word "war" is uttered, the answer will continue to be:  "nothing."  We'll have Presidents now and then who are marginally more restrained than others -- as the current President is marginally more restrained than the prior one -- but what Lithwick calls our "willingness to suspend basic protections and become more contemptuous of American traditions and institutions" will continue unabated.