It has been reported today that Anwar al-Awlaki has been killed in Yemen, along with four other terrorists. While there are many who will rejoice at hearing this news, in reality they should be fearful as al-Awlaki was an American citizen. His death at the hands of the US government sets a precedent while allows for the US government to indiscriminately kill American citizens if they are deemed a “threat to national security.”
The authority to kill US citizens abroad was given to the CIA by the Bush administration after the 9/11 attacks. President Bush would allow for the killings “if strong evidence existed that an American was involved in organizing or carrying out terrorist actions against the United States or U.S. interests.” However, this is completely illegal as in 1981 then-President Reagan passed Executive Order 12333 which stated that "No person employed by or acting on behalf of the United States Government shall engage in, or conspire to engage in, assassination." Yet President Obama continued this illegal policy as in 2010 he took "the extraordinary step of authorizing the targeted killing of an American citizen, the radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who is believed to have shifted from encouraging attacks on the United States to directly participating in them."
While some may argue that strong evidence existed that al-Awlaki was "involved in organizing or carrying out terrorist actions against the United States or U.S. interests," the fact of the matter is that the US goes around the world killing anyone whom it deems a terrorist and this is quite worrisome. The definition of terrorist does not have to be someone like al-Awlaki, it could be
Anyone who donates money to a charity that turns up on Bush’s [or Obama's] list of "terrorist" organizations, or who speaks out against the government’s policies could be declared an "unlawful enemy combatant" and imprisoned indefinitely. That includes American citizens.According to an FBI memo released in 2003, an antiwar group were viewed as terrorists due to their opposition to the war in Iraq. Thus, anyone could easily be labeled a terrorist just for something as simple as opposing the government and potentially be a target for assassination.
And people say that America isn't becoming a police state.
