Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2014/06/26/lurking-inside-obamas-secret.html
We should really try to get someone to explain exactly what terrorist scenario they imagine happening if these laws/interpretations were made public.
The point of states/federal secrecy is to allow actions to be taken that can be preventable by whoever the action is against.
Surely itâs not just the American Publicâs outrage that these secrecy laws are about; there must be other countries involved, such as Saudi Arabia, that weâre attempting to subvert covertly.
This all is just a strange area of public policy and transparency that on either side of the debate, we appear to rely soley on the faith that our policies/redaction of policies, will be for the betterment.
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Yo dog, I heard you like secret drone lawsâŚ
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LAW: the system of rules that a particular country or community recognizes as regulating the actions of its members and may enforce by the imposition of penalties.
I understand the need a government has for secrecy, but it seems to me that by definition, laws canât be included under that umbrella, at least not for a law based society. It has to be public in order to be recognizable.
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Oh, thatâs easy. If the terrorists knew what the law was, then obviously they could find a way to kill American citizens while not doing anything illegal. Or, at least, while only breaking laws that have punishments that arenât quite as bad. And they could tie up the legal system by exploiting loopholes to prevent themselves from being punished!
You know, just like how we canât try the people in Guantanamo in a regular courts because they might somehow be found innocentâŚ
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I meant someone whose job it is to perform classifications of this stuff; perhaps even the judges that approve it.
Anybody else think these secret memos are turtles all the way down?
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Lets face it, rule of law is just a veneer that powerful use to justify their rule.
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Letâs not just face facts, but grow tired of complaining about them in bitter resignation, put our heads together, and come up with a plan.
Iâm thinking that it might be worse than that. Definitely turtles; but possibly in combination with one or more recursion terrapins or Klein tortoises.
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Lurking inside Obamaâs secret drone law: another secret drone law.
Obama, as President, does not write laws.
Obama is a no-fooling Constitutional scholar; youâd think that heâd be wise to the idea that secret law is not law at all.
on that, you are, sadly, dead wrong. the supreme court has affirmed that laws can in fact be kept secret. and the Constitution itself allows for secret debate (aka âlegislatingâ).
OK, letâs put aside whether or not you agree with this particular subject - drone killings. I think everyone (most people? reasonable people?) can agree that in a Representative Democracy we should not tolerate secret laws. How can you know if youâre running afoul of the law? Thatâs some pure Stalinist bullshit right there. SoâŚquestion time:
As fluffâŚit said, Obama cannot write laws. He is not part of the legislative branch. SoâŚis this a misreported subject? (The same way we know right away when the press has technology stuff so horribly wrong) Is this not a drone law, but an interpretation of existing laws that he believes makes it legal to use drones? Because those are two very different things with very different remedies.
Either way, is there ANY recourse? Because, if not, can not any president just make up secret laws left and right and fuck everyone over? And, if he does it fast enough, not end up with a revolution because heâs quashed everyone who would have opposed him? I am not some conspiracy guy who says Obama is going to do this. But in the same way that what bothers me MOST of all the things that bother me about drones is that youâre setting a precedent for killing people in countries you arenât at war at that could come back to bite us in the ass really hard, what bothers me is that it sets a precedent that some president, any president can use. So maybe you like the secret law for drone thing because itâs killing terrorists. But what about a secret law against ⌠whatever you think should have laws against it?
So are we truly helpless? Left to gripe on the internet? Is there nothing short of violence to solve it? And, seeing how horribly civil war has worked for every country (including our own) I would very much like to avoid that at all costs.
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A good start would be to learn how to play their game.
The Mayday Superpac might be a good place to test the waters.
AFAIK, these are all interpretations of law, by the executive branch. Theyâre likely a perquisite to take the actions that appear to violate other laws (ie, US citizen execution in foreign lands).
They could technically be challenged, but in this specific instance, the family of the victim would have to challenge. Since the act itself wasnât a âsecretâ, itâs not exactly hard to fathom a challenge where this secret memo would be used.
As I said above, itâd be nice if whoever authorized the secrecy of it explained why. But it could have simply been to prevent the terrorist from hiding when we make it known we want to kill our own citizen, who weâre convinced is a terrorist.
Iâm sure whoever prepared it believed there was a catch-22 in public discourse on the matter.
How naive. He writes writes a good deal of law (well, not personally, itâs written by the people who work for him). Not all law is legislation, and considering how incompetent the legislature has been lately, thereâs a lot left to fill in.
Maybe ideally laws are only written by congress, but they have ceded quite a lot of that power to the executive branch over the years. Should they want to, they can take it back, and they sometimes but, but they have given the executive powers to determine what the law is. Obama still has to work within the confines Congress sets up, of course, but a lot of the âlawsâ they pass amount to âlet the executive figure out what the actual law should be, following these guidelinesâ.
A good example here is Drug Classifications. Congress set up the framework, and leaves it to the executive to handle the details. Sometimes they will come in and override the executive, but the executive has quite a lot of power to determine what the actual law is thanks to the concept of delegated legislation.
The other example, as is seen here, is through executive âmemosâ and âordersâ. "executive orders have the full force of law[1] when they take authority from a power granted directly to the Executive by the Constitution, or are made in pursuance of certain Acts of Congress that explicitly delegate to the President some degree of discretionary power " - Executive order - Wikipedia
Also, wtf do secret laws have to do with secret debate?
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Can you cite that case or point us to an article?
Knowing what the Executive Branch claims to be the law it has made will result in more people becoming terrorists.
That doesnât seem to say what you think it does. The court said the plaintiff had no standing since they could not prove the law was effecting them. It did not rule on the legality of having a secret law. I think that story was covered here not too long ago.
EDIT: Here is a snippet from a previous article found on BB
The court didnât address the constitutionality of the FAA itself, but instead ruled that the plaintiffsâa group of lawyers, journalists, and human rights advocates who regularly communicate with likely âtargetsâ of FAA wiretappingâcouldnât prove the surveillance was âcertainly impending,â so therefore didnât have the âstandingâ necessary to sue
You canât expect to prevail if youâre fighting entities based on a corrupt premise (e.g.: PACs) with an entity based on a corrupt premise (e.g.: a PAC). Theyâll just call you cute and precious, laugh, and you will never make an impact on the system.
Itâs going to take something to push the power structures off the rails entirely so that we can start anew. Anything less is wishful thinking.
