March 07, 2013 By: Juanita Jean Herownself Category: Uncategorized
Welcome to The World's Most Dangerous Beauty Salon, Inc.
My name is Susan DuQuesnay Bankston. I live in Richmond, Texas, in the heart of Tom DeLay's old district. It's nuttier than squirrel poop here.
I am honored and privileged to know Miss Juanita Jean Herownself, hairdresser extraordinary and political maven. Since she does not have time to fiddle with this internet stuff, I type her website for her and you can read it if you want to. If you don't, she truly does not give a big bear's butt.
A lot of what I post here has to do with local politics, but you probably have the same folks in your local government.
This ain't a blog. Blogs are way too trendy for me. This is a professional political organization.
Mr. Paul’s next question will be, “Does the President of the United States have the authority to run amok down the Mall with a bloody knife in his teeth?” Which is about as likely to happen as using weaponized drones to kill American citizens in American territory.
1That is the most courteous smackdown I’ve read in a long while.
2“…not engaged in combat…”
Sorry, but that seems pretty weasely to me. I have almost no occasion to agree with Rand Paul on anything, but this is one of those hen’s teeth. The US government should not engage in the extrajudicial killing of Americans. No matter where they are. With any kind of weapon. Period.
This way lies madness.
3“That’s one thing if you want to try her for treason, but are you going to just drop a drone, a Hellfire missile on Jane Fonda?” said Rand Paul.
4I think Mr Paul could have used a more appropriate example of treason. For instance, if someone were to reveal the identity of a spy. Like Dick Cheney and Valerie Plame. But… that would make it more difficult to argue against the use of drones and hellfire missiles on American soil…
I agree with SomedayGirl. This goes hand-in-hand with the NDAA that includes indefinite detention of Americans that was signed by Obama . When I read that he had signed that first NDAA bill allowing this, it became clear to me that we were sliding down the slope of fascism.
5Through the advise-and-consent process, Paul got an answer to his question. Now a good question to ask would be, “why was that so hard”?
Not at all a fan of the senator. Am a big fan of his actions in this single regard.
6Holder’s letter was pure class. Unfortunately, I find Rand Paul in most instances to be pure crass. This fillibuster was simply a way of getting out of other much more crucial business that needed doing. I am more and more of the mind that anyone who wants the ultimate ego trip chooses to run for Congress. Look at Louie-louie and his ilk.
7Someday Girl, he was quoting Rand Paul, not weaseling the question. He answered what he was asked, and rather elegantly, I thought.
8Of course filibusters are theater, but Paul raised an issue that needs to be discussed. Maybe Obama won’t use drones against civilians on U.S. soil, but unless its legally clear that U.S. authorities can’t “take out” citizens for “suspected” terrorism (and who the heck knows what “terrorism” is?) the next guy, or the next one, can and likely will do that. If the “Ds” had gotten a bit theatrical when the Patriot Act was rammed through, maybe we’d have been better off, and those of us who are U.S. citizens (and live aboard) wouldn’t have to consider the (right now theoretical and not immediately plausible) idea of drone attacks on our neighbors — I’m serious, living in Sinaloa, I can easily see the U.S. deciding our exporters of non-regulated agricultural produce to the United States is some sort of national security issue, and the U.S. launching a drone attack on… oh… maybe a busload of birdwatching tourists.
9The use of drones on U.S. soil by the government at all is a hot topic because of privacy issues. Currently there are watchdog groups paying very close attention to advocate against them flying over personal property without a warrant or the landowner’s permission.
Since I am a huge proponent of privacy, but also work for DPS, I can see both sides of this issue. Especially down on the Rio Grande border where we are fighting drug and human trafficking every day, using drones would save the tax payers a lot of money over only using helicopters for air support as they do now. Not armed ones, just ones with surveillance capability, to give the local police, state troopers, and U.S. Border Patrol a better idea of where the crossings are at any particular time, as they are moved often. That means they could get ahead of the drug caravans and the coyotes before they made it to the interstates and started dispersing throughout the country.
10Ya know, this is one of those Patriot Act disasters that Bush-Cheney thrust on us. We should not use drones domestically; we ought to be more careful in combat areas! We should not detain people in violation of habeus corpus. We should not be wiretapping each other. We should not be taking cell phone records and examining them because it is convenient to law enforcement and other snoopy types. All these actions are clear violations of our privacy and encroachments upon our civil liberties! They are meant to require subpoenas that are granted for demonstrable probable cause! Miranda is dying the death of a thousand cuts, most of them attributable to the paroxysm of security related convulsions Congress suffered in the aftermath of 9-11-01! Most of this was BAD LEGISLATION! The Prez doesn’t need to be ordering drone strikes!
Now to Rand Paul: even a broken clock is correct twice a day. Mr Paul accidentally stumbled upon a real issue. At least he had the conviction to actually engage in a REAL filibuster – that is, until nature became too strident to ignore!
11richmx2, I’m as much worried about private use of drones. Did you hear the news article about the Alitalia pilot that called in a drone it saw within 200 feet of the plane when it was on final for JFK Airport? The news article I saw on ABC yesterday said that even with a camera, a 4-prop drone like this can go for less than $400. How’s that for terror scary? They are much too small to be picked up by most radar, I believe, and many of them are made mostly of plastic, further obscuring their echo. Get it sucked down a jumbo jet’s engine and it could easily be “goodbye jumbo jet.”
12http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/04/us/new-york-drone-report/index.html (none of the drone pictures show mimic the one described by the pilot)
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/03/ufo-black-drone-fbi/ (better picture of drone type, wrong color)
I understand the concern about drones.
But
They are more concerned about drones but not about gun violence? Rand Paul care about American being killed by drones, but not gun violence? Why, because a black man can is in charge of the killing?
How many Americans will be killed by drones vs. how many will be killed by guns?
are you more likely to be killed by a drone or by a gun?
The Huffington post has pictures of kids killed by drones.
13Why don’t we have pictures of American children killed by gun violence? We see their before pictures.
Why is one worse then the other?
Amen, Diane, Amen.
14One of the things we mock Republicans for is their lock-step, non-thinking support and obstruction for what (R) leadership tells them to. Rand Paul’s concern, however wrong-timed about them is a dialogue this country needs.
I also wonder about Holder’s class since this letter came within 24 hours of Holder’s telling Congress that no bank should fear him prosecuting them for criminal behavior.
I really wish the administration were liberal, but they are not and while the President was far better than the alternative, one of the BIG mistakes liberals made in the first term was huddle around him, protecting him from all criticism and the only people Obama ended up listening to was the Right.
15Yes, I’m with you on that too, Diane.
16This is a manufactured issue. Has a weaponized drone ever been used up to now to kill an American citizen on American soil? Never – to the best of anyone’s knowledge.
Is that ever likely to happen in the future? No. We have many other law enforcement and justice system tools to interdict enemy combatants and terrorists within our borders.
Have weaponized drones been deployed against Americans outside our borders? Probably, and that makes perfect sense if the American is an enemy combatant – fighting for the other side against us. If an American has joined al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, he’s in a combat zone and doesn’t merit the benefit of our sending a sheriff’s posse out to handcuff him and bring him back for trial.
SomedayGirl says: “The US government should not engage in the extrajudicial killing of Americans. No matter where they are. With any kind of weapon. Period.”
Sorry, but I disagree. War is extrajudicial. Nevertheless, the forces of the United States follow rules of engagement that comply with the international conventions. Outlaw war and that assertion may have some validity, but until then …
17Why should the President be responsible for attacking citizens on US soil with drones since the discussions now is allowing local police groups to have them. Now that’s scary stuff considering what they were doing with pepper spray.
18Think Arizona with drones for local law enforcement.
Paul didn’t go far enough, though I tend to think his “fears” are with these self declared ” Patriot ” groups dressed in cam garb playing with assault weapons to get ready to defend their rights.
Good line of thought, Carol. You’ve opened a new direction regarding drones. Let’s take it a step further. Drone technology is cheap and widespread. How easy will it be for criminals or terrorists to employ weaponized drones for any manner of exploits? Forget about the legality arguments involving weaponized drones for local law enforcement. Criminal potential is much more worrisome.
Here’s another one. How about drones that allow Mexican drug smugglers to fly shipments across the border? The latest smuggling angle is cannons. Drones could be the next step, and their range would be much greater.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/03/how-far-could-a-drug-cannon-shoot/
19Property owners do not own the space above their property. Your neighbor can go to Google Earth or Map Quest & zero in in your backyard pool or barbeque, although not in real time. I could see the practicality of using drones (with a warrant) in cases of suspected criminality. On the other hand, I could see massive abuse of the technology. Since Rand Paul is getting theoretical, I’ll pose this question. If an American was walking down the street with a suitcase-size dirty bomb, would you try to arrest him? Or, would you send in the drone? I don’t have the answer. Maybe I would suggest Paul try to read him his rights. Regardless, he got his 13 hours of fame, & he’s definitely running again in 2016.
20Concerns about privacy have gone by the wayside, what with everybody and his uncle having a cell phone complete with camera. Anybody, anywhere, can take pictures of you, your property, your activities at any time, anywhere and post it online. Is there such a huge difference between the government randomly digitally taking pictures of everything or some stranger on the street?
21Since I’m a suspicious bitch anyway, I find my first question is about names weighing in that I don’t recall seeing before..I will stop there for now..
22Since George Washington was President, there have been unwritten rules about times and places and citizens who are perceived to be a threat.
It is my opinion, that people who think any person in power is “going to use weapons to kill US Citizens on US soil” is probably best advised to find a better place..your paranoia is not only misplaced, so is your citizenship.
A majority elected this President.We dealt with Bush- Deal with the President for three and a half more years, or find a better place.
You obviously think there is one..
Gotta agree with aj here. I’m not giving Rand Paul credit for anything beyond his ability heighten the fear factor in not-very-bright people and use it to the advantage of the tea party folks.
Fearing the government is going to confiscate all the guns and send in the drones doesn’t exactly keep me awake at night.
23Amen and amen, Rubymay!
24Once the administration decided it was okay to off al-Aulaqi and his kid – without warrant, without charge, without trial – because he was cheerleading for terrorists and we found that irksome, the clock started ticking on when it would be okay to try that at home and not just in Yemen. Not backing off on this one, Umptydump. It’s not okay. We snatched up bin Laden’s kid and brought him to the US for trial – we can do that for a foreign national, but we drop a Hellfire on an American? Nope, not okay.
And absolutely we had the Bush admin to thanks for this fine mess, as Aggieland liz points out. I can only imagine the hollering from my fellow lefties if John Yoo had asserted we could drone Americans overseas, and the audible eyerolls if Ashcroft had penned a note that we can’t at home.
25Then we agree to disagree. Rather than accept your word or mine about whether al-Aulaqi was a cheerleader or a terrorist and active enemy combatant, may I respectfully suggest that it’s worthwhile for those interested to do their own research and draw their own conclusions about whether the U.S. drone attacks that took the lives of him and his son were justified.
26Amen, Umptydump. And SomedayGirl, I’m going to respectfully, but emphatically, have to disagree with you. Emphatically.
27Could someone explain the difference betweeen PBO ordering the extrajudicial, extraterritorial killing of the al-Alwakis and Pinochet ordering the extrajudicial, extraterritorial killing of Orlando Letelier?
28How about when Paul said “Obamanation” instead of “abomination” when talking about drones striking people in cafes?
29Paul acts like a little snotty-nosed kid, who just learned his first cuss words!
Sen Goober Graham with this fantastic quote shut-up the republican senators with this statement:
30” But to my republican colleagues, “I don’t recall any of you coming down here suggesting that President Bush was going to kill anyone with a drone.”
“The Rude Pundit” has his say about Rand!
http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/
31Just to mix it up a bit, it may be surprising to realize that the U.S government killed nearly 75,000 American citizens on U.S. soil. It happened about 150 years ago. The citizens were soldiers for the Confederacy, rebels but still considered U.S. citizens, and the U.S. government always regarded the secessionist states as still belonging to the Union.
32I suspect that the main reason why Senator Ayn Rand got so exercised over this issue is that the most likely target of a drone strike on domestic soil would be a person engaged in domestic terrorism and the most likely people to be engaging in domestic terrorism are the kind of people who become Tea Baggers. http://www.splcenter.org/home/splc-letter-to-DOJ-DHS
33We’ve killed Americans on foriegn soil before. In WW II. Jim wrote about it in Stonekettle station. http://www.stonekettle.com/2011/10/consequences.html. I highly recommend his take on the subject of the attack on Anwar al-Awlaki. It never hurts to question what’s being done in our name, and the administration is obviously doing a crappy job of communicating (except for Holder’s letter above). Maybe the use of drones needs to be completely rethought. I don’t think so, but I’m willing to have an intelligent conversation about it. Rand Paul – was just raising a bunch of money and his profile for his 2016 run.
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