by Mike Adams

the Health Ranger
October 11, 2011

from NaturalNews Website

You know things are bad in the realm of tyranny when even Reuters runs a story that admits the White House openly engages in the outright murder of U.S. citizens whom the White House deems "enemies."

 

In an article entitled, Secret panel can put Americans on "kill list", Reuters reported:

"American militants like Anwar al-Awlaki are placed on a kill or capture list by a secretive panel of senior government officials, which then informs the president of its decisions, according to officials.

 

There is no public record of the operations or decisions of the panel, which is a subset of the White House's National Security Council, several current and former officials said. Neither is there any law establishing its existence or setting out the rules by which it is supposed to operate."

If that sounds like a report you'd usually read on NaturalNews or InfoWars, that's because we're usually the first to report on true conspiracies that exist in the corrupt, criminal government running rampant across America today. But this particular assassination conspiracy was so outrageous - and so illegal - that even Reuters had to cover it (to their credit, by the way).

The existence of this secret "kill list" means the U.S. government can now decide, completely outside of law, to brazenly murder any person it wishes. And this is all apparently A-OK with President Obama, the Nobel Peace Prize winner!

I wonder if the Nobel Peace Prize committee will consider revoking its peace prize from a recipient who now operates as part of a secret "kill list" murder squad. If not, then we ought to just rename the whole thing the Nobel Murder Prize, huh?

Orwell said it best:

War is peace! Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength...

 

ABC News even went to bat on this issue

Reuters wasn't alone, by the way, in questioning the White House justification for this murder.

 

ABC News Reporter Jake Tapper also had some hard-hitting questions for White House Press Secretary Jay Carney about the legal justification (ha!) for this killing of an American-born man.

Watch the jaw-dropping exchange between Jake Tapper and Jay Carney in the following video link.

 

This will give you a deep (and disturbing) understanding of the astonishing lawlessness that has taken hold in America, where the term due process means absolutely nothing and the President's men can now simply order the murder of anyone he wants, for any reason, without presenting even a shred of evidence to support such actions:

 

 

The full transcript of this exchange is found below.
 

 

 

The quagmire of murderous government

How many laws and rights has President Obama violated in this executive murder of an American citizen?

Let's see:

• There are federal laws against murder

• There are two amendments in the Bill of Rights that protect due process

• There is an executive order on the books banning assassinations

• Plus, there's is God's law (or natural law) under which the unjustified murder of another human being is a severe violation

But the Obama administration says murder is right only as long as the U.S. government does it.

 

This is equivalent to arguing that the King's word is law because the King says it is, which implies that the King is gifted some supernatural authority which the People themselves do not possess. And that stands in complete violation of the very founding principles of our nation which exists on the commonsense premise that All Men Are Created Equal - i.e. there is no "King" among us whose actions or intentions are immune from the scrutiny of law.

Don't misunderstand me in all this: I'm not saying the target of all this - Anwar al-Awlaki - is innocent.

 

But the point is that we don't really KNOW who is innocent or guilty until evidence is presented and a person has their day in court. One of the most fundamental principles of Common Law is that those accused of crimes may face their accusers and see the evidence presented against them. This is guaranteed under U.S. law as well as the Bill of Rights.

 

Yet President Obama - who has also seen fit to continue Bush's torture regime at Gitmo - apparently believes all those laws and rights do not apply to the government itself.

 

The King again, remember?

Friends, this is the very definition of tyranny. You are staring it in the face. Secret kill lists? Really? Why not just roll in the Stasi secret police or Nazi SS?

 

This is how it starts:

First the killing is "only" for real enemies. And then it's for political enemies.

Then it's for journalists, entrepreneurs and academics... until you end up with a total police state tyranny where the government itself is held back by nothing other than the whims and fetishes of its own tyrants who operate under the delusion that they are granted power over the common people by God himself. This is what all kings and tyrants throughout world history have believed, by the way.

Jake Tapper from ABC News stood up to Carney over all this.

 

That's why he asked these pointed questions which Jay Carney flippantly dismissed, almost as if to say,

"How dare the slaves ask their King to explain his actions!"

 

 

We are about to lose the Republic to total tyranny

That's where things are in America today:

Your rights have been overrun.

The laws that were once meticulously constructed to place limits on the government itself have been utterly abandoned by that government even as the complacent People watched and did nothing for far too long.

Tyrants in the government today now run surveillance on raw milk distribution centers, threaten home gardeners with prison time and bring guns to the front steps of innocent moms to force their children to take psychiatric medications.

 

Government now murders Americans using secret kill lists, and then does not even feel it has any obligation whatsoever to present any evidence at all supporting its actions!

If there are no limits on this government power, and the government itself willfully violates the law at every opportunity, then where do you suppose this is all headed? It can only end with the total concentration of power into the hands of tyrants.

 

If you disagree with that, I ask you: What will stop that from happening? Huh? What will stop it?

The zombies in Atlanta sure won't stop it. They're too engaged in their hypnotic collectivist chant to think for themselves.

 

The Democrats and Republicans sure won't stop it. They all worship Big Government, after all, because that's from where they both draw their power. And the executive branch of the government itself won't stop it - they're the ones who gain power from all this tyranny!

There is no one who can stop this other that We the People - People who take to the streets and resist tyranny, speak out against criminality in the government, and nip at the heels of tyrants at every opportunity.

Run the tyrants out of town, I say. Demand the restoration of our Republic, which means that ALL MEN (and woman) must abide by the same laws and recognize the same rights of others. There are no exceptions to these rules. Those who violate them are operating outside the law and are therefore criminals who should be arrested and prosecuted.

Mark my words, friends: If we allow our own government to run a secret kill list targeting "guilty" Americans, then it won't be long before we find ourselves on it.

There are times in history when the criminality of the government is so outrageous, and so inexcusable, that it is not merely the right but the duty of the People to intervene and restore the rule of law upon those who falsely believe they are above it.
 

 

 

Transcript of exchange between Jake Tapper and Jay Carney

See the video far above:
 

TAPPER: You said that Awlaki was demonstrably and provably involved in operations. Do you plan on demonstrating --

MR. CARNEY: I should step back. He is clearly - I mean "provably" may be a legal term.

 

I think it has been well established, and it has certainly been the position of this administration and the previous administration that he is a leader in - was a leader in AQAP; that AQAP was a definite threat, was operational, planned and carried out terrorist attacks that, fortunately, did not succeed, but were extremely serious - including the ones specifically that I mentioned, in terms of the would-be Christmas Day bombing in 2009 and the attempt to bomb numerous cargo planes headed for the United States.

 

And he was obviously also an active recruiter of al Qaeda terrorists. So I don't think anybody in the field would dispute any of those assertions.
 

TAPPER: You don't think anybody else in the government would dispute that?

MR. CARNEY: Well, I wouldn’t know of any credible terrorist expert who would dispute the fact that he was a leader in al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, and that he was operationally involved in terrorist attacks against American interests and citizens.
 

TAPPER: Do you plan on bringing before the public any proof of these charges?

MR. CARNEY: Again, the question makes us - has embedded within it assumptions about the circumstances of his death that I’m just not going to address.
 

TAPPER: How on earth does it have - I really don't understand. How does - he’s dead. You are asserting that he had operational control of the cargo plot and the Abdulmutallab plot. He’s now dead. Can you tell us, or the American people - or has a judge been shown...

MR. CARNEY: Well, again, Jake, I’m not going to go any further than what I’ve said about the circumstances of his death and --
 

TAPPER: I don't even understand how they're tied.

MR. CARNEY: - the case against him, which, again, you’re linking. And I think that...
 

TAPPER: You said that he was responsible for these things.

MR. CARNEY: Yes, but again...
 

TAPPER: Is there going to be any evidence presented?

MR. CARNEY: I don't have anything for you on that.
 

TAPPER: Do you not see at all - does the administration not see at all how a President asserting that he has the right to kill an American citizen without due process, and that he’s not going to even explain why he thinks he has that right is troublesome to some people?

MR. CARNEY: I wasn’t aware of any of those things that you said actually happening. And again, I’m not going to address the circumstances of Awlaki’s death. I think, again, it is an important fact that this terrorist, who was actively plotting - had plotted in the past, and was actively plotting to attack Americans and American interests, is dead. But I’m not going to - from any angle - discuss the circumstances of his death.
 

TAPPER: Do you know that the Center for Constitutional Rights and the ACLU tried to get permission to represent Awlaki? And his father had asked them to do that. But they needed to get permission from the Treasury Department so that they could challenge his being on this targeted killing list. And the administration, the Obama administration refused to let them represent him, to not even - he couldn't even have the ACLU representing him.

MR. CARNEY: Well, I would send those questions, or take those questions to Treasury or Justice. I don't have anything on that for you.
 

TAPPER: What do you think constitutional law professor Barack Obama would make of this?

MR. CARNEY: I think he spoke about it today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Secret Panel Can Put...

Americans on "Kill List"
by Mark Hosenball
October 5, 2011

from Reuters Website

WASHINGTON
American militants like Anwar al-Awlaki are placed on a kill or capture list by a secretive panel of senior government officials, which then informs the president of its decisions, according to officials.

There is no public record of the operations or decisions of the panel, which is a subset of the White House's National Security Council, several current and former officials said. Neither is there any law establishing its existence or setting out the rules by which it is supposed to operate.

The panel was behind the decision to add Awlaki, a U.S.-born militant preacher with alleged al Qaeda connections, to the target list. He was killed by a CIA drone strike in Yemen late last month.

The role of the president in ordering or ratifying a decision to target a citizen is fuzzy. White House spokesman Tommy Vietor declined to discuss anything about the process.

Current and former officials said that to the best of their knowledge, Awlaki, who the White House said was a key figure in al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, al Qaeda's Yemen-based affiliate, had been the only American put on a government list targeting people for capture or death due to their alleged involvement with militants.

The White House is portraying the killing of Awlaki as a demonstration of President Barack Obama's toughness toward militants who threaten the United States. But the process that led to Awlaki's killing has drawn fierce criticism from both the political left and right.

In an ironic turn, Obama, who ran for president denouncing predecessor George W. Bush's expansive use of executive power in his "war on terrorism," is being attacked in some quarters for using similar tactics. They include secret legal justifications and undisclosed intelligence assessments.

Liberals criticized the drone attack on an American citizen as extra-judicial murder.

Conservatives criticized Obama for refusing to release a Justice Department legal opinion that reportedly justified killing Awlaki. They accuse Obama of hypocrisy, noting his administration insisted on publishing Bush-era administration legal memos justifying the use of interrogation techniques many equate with torture, but refused to make public its rationale for killing a citizen without due process.

Some details about how the administration went about targeting Awlaki emerged on Tuesday when the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Representative Dutch Ruppersberger, was asked by reporters about the killing.

The process involves,

"going through the National Security Council, then it eventually goes to the president, but the National Security Council does the investigation, they have lawyers, they review, they look at the situation, you have input from the military, and also, we make sure that we follow international law," Ruppersberger said.

 

 

LAWYERS CONSULTED

Other officials said the role of the president in the process was murkier than what Ruppersberger described.

They said targeting recommendations are drawn up by a committee of mid-level National Security Council and agency officials. Their recommendations are then sent to the panel of NSC "principals," meaning Cabinet secretaries and intelligence unit chiefs, for approval. The panel of principals could have different memberships when considering different operational issues, they said.

The officials insisted on anonymity to discuss sensitive information.

They confirmed that lawyers, including those in the Justice Department, were consulted before Awlaki's name was added to the target list.

Two principal legal theories were advanced, an official said: first, that the actions were permitted by Congress when it authorized the use of military forces against militants in the wake of the attacks of September 11, 2001; and they are permitted under international law if a country is defending itself.

Several officials said that when Awlaki became the first American put on the target list, Obama was not required personally to approve the targeting of a person. But one official said Obama would be notified of the principals' decision.

 

If he objected, the decision would be nullified, the official said.

A former official said one of the reasons for making senior officials principally responsible for nominating Americans for the target list was to "protect" the president.

Officials confirmed that a second American, Samir Khan, was killed in the drone attack that killed Awlaki. Khan had served as editor of Inspire, a glossy English-language magazine used by AQAP as a propaganda and recruitment vehicle.

But rather than being specifically targeted by drone operators, Khan was in the wrong place at the wrong time, officials said. Ruppersberger appeared to confirm that, saying Khan's death was "collateral," meaning he was not an intentional target of the drone strike.

When the name of a foreign, rather than American, militant is added to targeting lists, the decision is made within the intelligence community and normally does not require approval by high-level NSC officials.
 

 

 

'FROM INSPIRATIONAL TO OPERATIONAL'

Officials said Awlaki, whose fierce sermons were widely circulated on English-language militant websites, was targeted because Washington accumulated information his role in AQAP had gone "from inspirational to operational."

 

That meant that instead of just propagandizing in favor of al Qaeda objectives, Awlaki allegedly began to participate directly in plots against American targets.

"Let me underscore, Awlaki is no mere messenger but someone integrally involved in lethal terrorist activities," Daniel Benjamin, top counterterrorism official at the State Department, warned last spring.

The Obama administration has not made public an accounting of the classified evidence that Awlaki was operationally involved in planning terrorist attacks.

But officials acknowledged that some of the intelligence purporting to show Awlaki's hands-on role in plotting attacks was patchy.

For instance, one plot in which authorities have said Awlaki was involved Nigerian-born Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, accused of trying to blow up a Detroit-bound U.S. airliner on Christmas Day 2009 with a bomb hidden in his underpants.

There is no doubt Abdulmutallab was an admirer or follower of Awlaki, since he admitted that to U.S. investigators.

 

When he appeared in a Detroit courtroom earlier this week for the start of his trial on bomb-plot charges, he proclaimed,

"Anwar is alive."

But at the time the White House was considering putting Awlaki on the U.S. target list, intelligence connecting Awlaki specifically to Abdulmutallab and his alleged bomb plot was partial.

 

Officials said at the time the United States had voice intercepts involving a phone known to have been used by Awlaki and someone who they believed, but were not positive, was Abdulmutallab.

Awlaki was also implicated in a case in which a British Airways employee was imprisoned for plotting to blow up a U.S.-bound plane. E-mails retrieved by authorities from the employee's computer showed what an investigator described as "operational contact" between Britain and Yemen.

Authorities believe the contacts were mainly between the U.K.-based suspect and his brother. But there was a strong suspicion Awlaki was at the brother's side when the messages were dispatched.

 

British media reported that in one message, the person on the Yemeni end supposedly said,

"Our highest priority is the U.S... With the people you have, is it possible to get a package or a person with a package on board a flight heading to the U.S.?"

U.S. officials contrast intelligence suggesting Awlaki's involvement in specific plots with the activities of Adam Gadahn, an American citizen who became a principal English-language propagandist for the core al Qaeda network formerly led by Osama bin Laden.

While Gadahn appeared in angry videos calling for attacks on the United States, officials said he had not been specifically targeted for capture or killing by U.S. forces because he was regarded as a loudmouth not directly involved in plotting attacks.