ACLU: Heads Up! > Unchecked Executive War Power Could Slip Through the House.

[99th_Monkey]

Tucked inside the National Defense Authorization Act, being marked up by the House Armed Services Committee this week, is a hugely important provision that hasn't been getting a lot of attention — a brand new authorization for a worldwide war.

This stealth provision was added to the bill by the committee's chairman, Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.), but has a bit of a history. It was first proposed by former Attorney General Michael Mukasey in 2008 after the Bush administration lost the Boumediene v. Bush case, in which the Supreme Court decided that federal courts would subject the administration's asserted law of war basis to hold Guantanamo detainees to searching review. An idea that may have originally been intended to bolster the Bush administration's basis for holding Guantanamo detainees is now being promoted as an authorization of a worldwide war — and could become the single biggest ceding of unchecked war authority to the executive branch in modern American history.

http://www.aclu.org/blog/national-security/unchecked-executive-war-power-could-slip-through-house

[Leopolds Ghost]

1. We have always been at war with the world. We will always be at war with the world

Just think how many teenagers will hear about this and think "cool, just like my first person shooter games!"

[99th_Monkey]

5. Reminds me of that line in 1984 "we've always been at war with Eastasia" n/t

[Hannah Bell]

2. so tired of this shit. we're already in a worldwide war, ww3.

but we really have no idea what power exactly it is we're fighting.

[Solly Mack]

3. K&R

[no_hypocrisy]

4. Trouble is the provision is probably unconstitutional, but IT WON'T MATTER

because an unconstitutional law that isn't challenged has the same effect as a constitutional law.

[Initech]

6. You cant spell "We're American" without WAR

:nuke: