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Apologist for Assassination of Americans to Be Named as New Homeland Security Chief

George Washington's picture




 

Apologist for Assassination of Americans to Be Named as New Homeland Security Chief

 

USA Today reports:

President Obama plans to nominate former Pentagon attorney Jeh Johnson as the next secretary of homeland security, officials said Thursday.

Johnson is a supporter of assassinations … even against American citizens.

AP noted in 2011:

U.S. citizens are legitimate military targets when they take up arms with al-Qaida, top national security lawyers in the Obama administration said Thursday.

 

***

 

The government lawyers, CIA counsel Stephen Preston and Pentagon counsel Jeh Johnson … said U.S. citizens do not have immunity when they are at war with the United States.

 

Johnson said only the executive branch, not the courts, is equipped to make military battlefield targeting decisions about who qualifies as an enemy.

The New York Times noted:

Belligerents who also happen to be U.S. citizens do not enjoy immunity where non-citizen belligerents are valid military objectives,” said Jeh C. Johnson, the Defense Department general counsel, in a speech at Yale Law School.

 

***

 

Still, Mr. Johnson invoked a lawsuit filed by Mr. Awlaki’s father before the killing that had sought an injunction against targeting his son, citing with approval a district judge’s decision to dismiss the case and saying that targeting decisions are not suited to court review because they must be made quickly and based on fast-evolving intelligence.

 

***

 

“The legal point is important because, in fact, over the last 10 years Al Qaeda has not only become more decentralized, it has also, for the most part, migrated away from Afghanistan to other places where it can find safe haven,” Mr. Johnson said.

This is particularly concerning since the U.S. wants to expand the assassination program to cover “ASSOCIATES of ASSOCIATES” of Al Qaeda … and blurs the lines between bad guys and average Americans.    This violates a little thing called the Fifth Amendment.

The Washington Post points out:

[A senior administration official] added that Johnson was “responsible for the prior legal review and approval of every military operation approved by the president and secretary of defense” during Obama’s first term.

That presumably includes supporting Al Qaeda in Libya.

Wikipedia notes more unsavory aspects of Johnson’s background:

As General Counsel of the Defense Department, Johnson was a major player in certain key priorities of the Obama Administration, and he is considered one of the legal architects of the U.S. military’s current counterterrorism policies.

 

***

 

In August, 2010, Johnson was part of the public dialogue over the Wikileaks release of classified Pentagon documents known as the Afghan War Diary or The War Logs. “The Department of Defense will not negotiate some ‘minimized’ or ‘sanitized’ version of a release by WikiLeaks of additional U.S. government classified documents,” he wrote in a letter to Timothy J. Matusheski, a lawyer representing the online whistle-blowing organization pro bono. In August 2012, Johnson also wrote to the former Navy seal who authored the book “No Easy Day” and warned him of his material breach of his non-disclosure agreements with the Department of Defense.

 

***

 

In January 2011, Johnson provoked controversy when, according to a Department of Defense news story, he asserted in a speech at the Pentagon that deceased civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. would have supported the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, despite King’s outspoken opposition to American interventionism during his lifetime….  Jeremy Scahill called Johnson’s remarks “one of the most despicable attempts at revisionist use of Martin Luther King Jr. I’ve ever seen,” while Justin Elliott of Salon.com argued that based on Dr. King’s opposition to the Vietnam War, he would likely have opposed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the covert wars in Pakistan and Yemen.

 

***

 

In a February 2011, speech to the New York City Bar Association, Johnson “acknowledged the concerns raised” about the detention of alleged WikiLeaks source Private Bradley Manning and “stated that he had personally traveled to Quantico to conduct an investigation.” Human rights attorney and journalist Scott Horton wrote that “Johnson was remarkably unforthcoming about what he discovered and what conclusions he drew from his visit.”

Did the Saudi Intelligence Chief and Other High-Ranking Officials Trade on Inside Information Regarding 9/11?

Mass surveillance by the NSA and other government agencies is not really making us safer, but is being used for other reasons.

For example:

Saudi Prince Bandar – head of Saudi intelligence – helped to arm the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan, and is now arming Al Qaeda in Syria. (Background).

Respected financial writer Ambrose Evans-Pritchard says that Prince Bandar admitted that Saudi Arabia carries out false flag terror.  Indeed,  U.S. government officials say that the Saudi government had a hand in 9/11.

Moreover, several financial and economic experts – such as Jim Rickards, Max Keiser, German central bank president Ernst Welteke, Swiss economists Remo Crameri, Marc Chesney, Loriano Mancini and Bill Bergman (senior financial markets policy analyst for the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago for 13 years) – say that there were insider trades right before 9/11 by people who knew the attacks were coming … people  with “no conceivable ties to al-Qaeda” according to the 9/11 Commission.

You don’t have to believe that 9/11 was an inside job to believe that this theory is at least possible. After all, 9/11 was foreseeable to people in intelligence services worldwide … as was Al Qaeda flying planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

For example, the NSA, CIA and other intelligence agencies were listening in on the hijackers’ calls, and an FBI informant rented a room to two of the hijackers in San Diego.

Now, Max Keiser alleges that this story is about to be blown wide open:

Within a few months, there’s a book coming out by a friend of mine who’s already had a very popular book which went to the top of the New York Times Bestseller list. It’s a new book, he’s shown me the gallies. Chapter 1: talks about his eyewitness accounts being in the room in the CIA discussing trading inside information days ahead of 9/11. He’s talking about [Saudi intelligence chief Prince] Bandar, he’s talking about Tony Blair, he’s talking about [then executive director of the CIA] Buzzy Krongard.

Is Keiser right? Will the book really be published, and will it really make this allegation? Is the former CIA officer and bestselling author credible?

 

We’ll have to wait to find out.

 

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Fri, 10/18/2013 - 15:47 | 4069969 Tall Tom
Tall Tom's picture

TYLER...BAN THE RACIST PUKES AS YOU SAY YOU WILL DO. (INCLUDING THE ONES THAT GREEN ARROWED AND APPROVED.)

 

It makes no difference what color anybody's skin is. What a bunch of IGNORANT SLIMEBALLS.

Sat, 10/19/2013 - 09:11 | 4071538 BeetleBailey
BeetleBailey's picture

Nope...just calling a fucking spade a God Damn Nazi spade is all....

Ignorant? Nitto on that one too pops...these fuckers don't hesitate to use the race card at the drop of a hat.....so it's on them.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 18:29 | 4070496 nmewn
nmewn's picture

Its a slippery slope my man.

For instance, I despise self important, anorexic, health nuts who check their blood pressure & heart rate every hour and want everyone to be just like them or penalize them because they don't eat fucking dandelions and other edible weeds.

Someday...someone will say ban me for that, if they haven't said it already ;-)

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 20:10 | 4070790 shovelhead
shovelhead's picture

They'll have to take my Cheetos...

FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 19:18 | 4070649 knukles
knukles's picture

nmewn, you have just crossed over the line!
Tyler!

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 15:51 | 4069992 Mi Naem
Mi Naem's picture

Tall Tom,

You're doin it wrong there brother. 

Try this link: http://www.zerohedge.com/help/report-offensive-comments

In my experience, it works better than rants.  Good Luck. 

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 08:48 | 4068280 GMadScientist
GMadScientist's picture

We're sorry you got raped in juvie, precious.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 20:08 | 4067193 Dewey Cheatum Howe
Dewey Cheatum Howe's picture

Fast and Furious just got hot again. Now with grenades to go along with them guns.

http://m.cbsnews.com/fullstory.rbml?catid=57607918&feed_id=30&videofeed=...

Deadly drug cartel shootout with Mexico police linked to "grenade-walking" scandal
October 17, 2013
by CBNews.com

(CBS News) CBS News has learned of a shocking link between a deadly drug cartel shootout with Mexican police last week and a controversial case in the U.S. The link is one of the grenades used in the violent fight, which killed three policemen and four cartel members and was captured on video by residents in the area.

According to a Justice Department "Significant Incident Report" filed Tuesday and obtained by CBS News, evidence connects one of the grenades to Jean Baptiste Kingery, an alleged firearms trafficker U.S. officials allowed to operate for years without arresting despite significant evidence that he was moving massive amounts of grenade parts and ammunition to Mexico's ruthless drug cartels.

Read the Significant Incident Report

"Grenade-walking" part of "Gunwalking" scandal
New evidence in ATF's mysterious grenade smuggler case
Complete coverage of the gunwalking scandal

The gun battle took place last week in Guadalajara. Authorities say five members of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel used at least nine firearms and ten hand grenades against Mexican police. If one of the grenades was supplied with the help of Kingery, as believed, it adds to the toll of lives taken with weapons trafficked by suspects U.S. officials watched but did not stop.

The Kingery case was overseen by the same Arizona U.S. Attorney and ATF office that let suspects traffic thousands of weapons to Mexican drug cartels in the operation dubbed Fast and Furious. The strategy was to try to get to the cartel kingpins, but it was halted after CBS News reported that Fast and Furious weapons were used by cartel thugs in the murder of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry on December 15, 2010. Weapons trafficked by other ATF suspects under surveillance were used two months later in the cartel murder of Immigration and Customs Agent Jaime Zapata in Mexico on February 15, 2011.

On Wednesday, ATF told CBS News it has "no information" about the Kingery connection to last week's gun battle in Mexico.

As CBS News previously reported, documents show ATF began watching Kingery in "2004 related to AK47 purchases" he was believed to be trafficking to Mexico.

In 2009, ATF also learned Kingery was dealing in grenades; weapons of choice for Mexico's killer cartels. Documents show they developed a secret plan to let him smuggle parts to Mexico in early 2010 and follow him to his factory. Some ATF agents vehemently objected, worried that Kingery would disappear once he crossed the border into Mexico. That's exactly what happened.

Kingery resurfaced several months later in 2010, trying to smuggle a stash of grenade bodies and ammunition into Mexico, but was again let go when prosecutors allegedly said they couldn't build a good case. In 2011, Mexican authorities finally raided Kingery's factory and arrested him -- they say he confessed to teaching cartel members how to build grenades and convert semi-automatic weapons to automatic. The Justice Department has not provided an update on whether it's trying to extradite Kingery to the U.S., and an ATF spokesman said on Wednesday that he doesn't know the status of his case.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 19:35 | 4070695 Serfs_Up
Serfs_Up's picture

 NOTHING is going to happen to those involved...shit, they'll be promoted...CLINTON/HOLDER 2016    /sarc

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 06:50 | 4068073 nmewn
nmewn's picture

Could someone please explain to Holder you don't need a grenade to hunt deer ;-)

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 12:01 | 4069044 monad
monad's picture

Thats Holder's Obamacare contribution. 634M went somewhere...

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 08:32 | 4068229 y3maxx
y3maxx's picture

American Citizens and Vets should build gallows(real or symbolic) and wheel them on to the Washington Mall.

And anyone can note, the recent surge of top head Military replacements by Obama with loyal Yes Men is the continuation of a growing Dictatorship.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 08:50 | 4068287 GMadScientist
GMadScientist's picture

They had a guillotine in France, and now they're all but communists.

Save your energy; you'll need it. 

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 08:59 | 4068323 john39
john39's picture

chaos usually favors the evil among us, which is why they provoke and unleash chaos in the first place.  it allows them to get a tighter grip on the masses, disguised as restoring law and order.  

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 15:02 | 4069806 dontgoforit
dontgoforit's picture

Evil has an advantage: it will do anything to maintain itself.  Good on the other hand has a moral compass that will not let it walk into the dark nether-region.

Sat, 10/19/2013 - 09:35 | 4071567 nmewn
nmewn's picture

Its a fair point you bring up. And an interesting one to ponder. I think everyone struggles with the proposition as do I, evil would seem invincible because of its complete lack of morality.

But is it really immoral for us to lie/decieve evil for the purpose of its destruction? Personally, I don't think it is.

Of course this is only my opinion but everyone must agree that a couple of the attributes in morality are, its fairness & equal treatment.

So stipulated, the moral meets the evil and see's it for what it is.

Now, by "taking unfair advantage" of evil (if there is such a thing...lol) by the deception of or the destruction of it, what have we done to damage our own morality? We met evil on equal footing, played by its rules (lied to it) and prevailed (or lost) for the common good. How have we ceded any moral ground among our peers in doing so?...evil was treated "fairly & equally" by its own view of "morality" that it loves to throw in our face...which is, of course, opposite to ours.

Everyone still with me? ;-)

For instance, it cannot be immoral to lie to a mugger and say you don't have any money when you actually do, as the intent is for the evil (the mugger) to steal it from you. Or (continuing this stream of thought) immoral to say...its right here, please don't hurt me, to put evil at ease for just a moment...as you pull a gun from your money pocket and kill him.

You just decieved/lied to evil as you destroyed evil, there can be nothing immoral about that. The same can be applied against the rapist, the murderer or whatever other evil.

I would hope I could be forgiven by my peers for my actions but more importantly, by my God ;-)

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 07:05 | 4068088 overmedicatedun...
overmedicatedundersexed's picture

a unarmed black young mother with enfant child is gunned down in a hail of bullets. the killing is filmed and our MSM ignores it, a white mother with enfant at her breast is shot in the head while standing in her home by an FBI sniper-MSM silence, dozens of children burned to death in a raid on a private compound in waco, MSM silence.

where are the media hounds who run to the public podium and are all given face time? AL, Jackson,alred,where are the ivy league lawyers demanding justice? there is no conspiracy, no none at all.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 07:50 | 4068155 overmedicatedun...
overmedicatedundersexed's picture

assassination is not just for a jack and Bobby, it's  the common man's right as well freely provided by own protectors in blue and our watchful .gov ..PS where are the religious leaders demanding justice for the execution of an unarmed black mother?? why the silence..most of us on ZH know the answer..sickening to live in this society of hypocrits.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 07:25 | 4068113 nmewn
nmewn's picture

I fully expect Biden, to now advise his wife if she feels threatened, to just lob a couple grenades off the balconey.

Yes, no agenda at all ;-)

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 22:24 | 4067607 the grateful un...
the grateful unemployed's picture

Kingery. Boating Accident....

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 20:42 | 4067298 George Washington
George Washington's picture

Wow ...

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:55 | 4067147 lex parsimoniae
lex parsimoniae's picture

Belligerents who also happen to be U.S. citizens do not enjoy immunity.."

hmm.. define belligerents please?

Actually, this statement belies their true intentions rather clearly. Thanks for the heads up Jeh..

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 06:29 | 4068061 Wahooo
Wahooo's picture

Belligerents = anyone who is brown

Imminent = at any time

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 20:02 | 4070777 shovelhead
shovelhead's picture

What happens if I'm mildly unpleasant instead of outright belligerent?

Free trip to an aircraft carrier?

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:59 | 4067163 El Vaquero
El Vaquero's picture

Yes, define "belligerents" and while they're at it, they should also define "imminent."  I'll betcha the .gov definitions are different than yours or mine.  In fact, I know that their definition for "imminent" is different, because it does not mean "about to happen" to them, and that's straight from the Obama administration in that little white paper they had justifying the assassination of US citizens. 

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:16 | 4067011 the grateful un...
the grateful unemployed's picture

well apparently obama is a target because he has taken up arms with Al Qaeda in Syria. wasn't sure 9/11 was an inside job, but obama sealed the deal

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:12 | 4066994 williambanzai7
williambanzai7's picture

The unending supply of vile and disgusting people standing by to take up senior government positions never ceases to amaze,

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 11:41 | 4068935 firstdivision
firstdivision's picture

I applied for the NSA Chief position, but putting "target banks/politicians while front-running Goldman's Prop Desk in my personal account" on the Objectives line, may have disqualified me.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 23:39 | 4067785 Chuck Walla
Chuck Walla's picture

But foreign killers must be brought here for the courts to rule, with civil rights. Mr. Banzai is right on.

FORWARD SOVIET!

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 20:10 | 4067202 lex parsimoniae
lex parsimoniae's picture

tru dat!

What has also amazed me is how many of the surnames of these vile and disgusting people are the same cockroaches we've read about since the progressive movement began taking it's cues from the Bolsheviks in the early 1900's.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:50 | 4067125 Peter Pan
Peter Pan's picture

It is a fact of life that sewers never run dry, hence the unending supply of vermin to top positions.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 23:25 | 4067764 Tompooz
Tompooz's picture

When the police state starts shaking up society, the scum floats to the surface and the most ruthless part of that to the top..

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:45 | 4067105 lotsoffun
lotsoffun's picture

hi.  i'm anthony weiner and i resemble those comments.  and hi, i'm chuck shumer and was his mentor.  and hi, we're jamie and lloyd and we'd like you to know that we funded this project.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:20 | 4067029 El Vaquero
El Vaquero's picture

Junior positions aren't exempt from this phenomenon.  At all levels, federal, state and local. 

 

Those vile people had to get their starts somewhere. 

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 18:41 | 4066906 El Vaquero
El Vaquero's picture

"You don’t have to believe that 9/11 was an inside job to believe that this theory is at least possible. After all, 9/11 was foreseeable to people in intelligence services worldwide … as was Al Qaeda flying planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon."

 

That would mean it was allowed to happen.  Which would lead to people who think that it was an inside job being looked upon as nutters while there was still, in fact, a conspiracy on the US's part. 

 

Think about that shit for a while. 

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 19:12 | 4070630 geekgrrl
geekgrrl's picture

WTC7 is impossible to explain under the "it was allowed to happen" scenario. It was obviously a controlled demolition, begging the question exactly who setup the explosive charges in a highly secure building that contained federal offices.

One investigative journalist who has looked into this matter in depth is Christopher Bollyn. I might fun afoul of rules here were I to say who Bollyn implicates in his investigation, but for folks looking to understand what really happened, I highly recommend his work.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 20:00 | 4070773 Lost Word
Lost Word's picture

And + 1000

Spoiler Alert : It was the ZOG.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:52 | 4067129 thestarl
thestarl's picture

I know the official version of events is so flawed.If it was possible to waterboard Cheney i think a clearer picture would emerge.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 19:54 | 4067141 MisterMousePotato
MisterMousePotato's picture

"After all, 9/11 was foreseeable to people in intelligence services worldwide ... ."

What the hell. Using commercial aircraft was foreseeable to anyone who read Tom Clancy or half a dozen other popular authors of the genre.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 11:39 | 4068926 firstdivision
firstdivision's picture

That's how you know it was an inside job.  Why strike DC on a normal day when you can hit Congress during the the State of the Union (like in the book)

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 03:20 | 4067986 DelusionalGrandeur
DelusionalGrandeur's picture

That would be a fat finger junk on my part....I absolutely agree. Anyone  paying the least bit of attention would agree too.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 08:54 | 4068303 GMadScientist
GMadScientist's picture

You know you can change your vote by pressing the up arrow, right?

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 23:03 | 4071148 geekgrrl
geekgrrl's picture

It's pretty funny that someone down-arrowed you for that.

Sun, 10/20/2013 - 03:57 | 4073056 MisterMousePotato
MisterMousePotato's picture

Sorry. Couldn't resist.

Mon, 10/21/2013 - 17:43 | 4077369 geekgrrl
geekgrrl's picture

Are you the mad junker?

Tue, 10/22/2013 - 18:08 | 4081024 MisterMousePotato
MisterMousePotato's picture

Just this once. I thought I was being clever. (Clever as you, anyway.)

Sun, 10/27/2013 - 00:52 | 4094507 geekgrrl
geekgrrl's picture

I'm not that clever. But your comment reminds me of a prof teaching vector mechanics. This guy could draw a 3-D picture out of the book on the chalkboard. Very impressive. When several students remarked about the precision of his drawings, he simply said: "Don't be too impressed; I've seen this done before."

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 06:34 | 4068065 Wahooo
Wahooo's picture

It's what happens when an institution becomes too big to fail. It also becomes too big to track and regulate. Our government is so big that those within it can do whatever they want without being noticed. Crimes committed in broad daylight by authoritarians duly elected and chosen.

Fri, 10/18/2013 - 07:34 | 4068135 Ying-Yang
Ying-Yang's picture

"What country ever existed a century and a half without a rebellion? And what country can preserve it's liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."

Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, Paris, 13 Nov. 1787

http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/tree-liberty-quotation

 

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