When protect and defend becomes search and destroy

I was poking around the interwebs when I found this gem. The link goes to a Mother Jones article (don't judge me) about Eric Holder's recent statements on targeted killing of US citizens at Northwestern University. Here's the link to his prepared statement posted on the DOJ website.

Anyone who's talked to me about politics for more than 10 minutes has figured out that I'm not a huge fan of the Eric Holder DOJ. I'm a proponent of equal justice for all, and he's not. I'm also a fan of the constitution, another difference between me and him. On this issue, though, he's right.

Speaking at Northwestern University Holder first went over the two legal options we have for dealing with terrorists and terrorism suspects, federal criminal courts and military tribunals. There's not a whole lot of controversy there, and I'm just going to gloss over them. Then he got to the interesting stuff, targeted killings. Over the past decade, the US has engaged in a program of identifying, locating, tracking and killing individuals identified as leaders in terrorist organizations.

It's a long speech, and a pretty good one, laying out the administration's policy on when they may carry out targeted killings. I'm not going to pull quote much from it, but you should take the time to read it fully. Just to clarify, I'm dealing with our treatment of American citizens only. I'm perfectly ok with us killing non-US citizens without warning or concern for their (non-existent) rights.

Speaking specifically about the targeted killings of US citizens abroad Holder said "Let me be clear: an operation using lethal force in a foreign country, targeted against a U.S. citizen who is a senior operational leader of al Qaeda or associated forces, and who is actively engaged in planning to kill Americans, would be lawful at least in the following circumstances: First, the U.S. government has determined, after a thorough and careful review, that the individual poses an imminent threat of violent attack against the United States; second, capture is not feasible; and third, the operation would be conducted in a manner consistent with applicable law of war principles."

This strikes me as a good balance. This policy allows us to kill those that need to be removed from the picture, but only as a last resort. This policy also requires timely congressional notification and regular reports to congress.

For practical reasons, we cannot allow anyone to seek shelter among our enemies abroad while they plan and execute attacks against American citizens and soldiers without fear of reprisal. Simply hiding out in an area too dangerous or remote for the FBI or JSOC to reach you shouldn't act as an immunity from response card.
At the same time, the targeted killing of an American needs to be the last resort. If we can realistically get them any other way and return them to US courts to be tried, we should. I'm very cautious about allowing the government to strip away anyone's rights, especially the due process rights for criminal defendants.

I do want to point out that this is essentially the same policy President Bush had during his two terms, and this was an issue that then-candidate Obama demagogued pretty mercilessly. Candidate Obama changed his position on several Bush-era policies after he took over the hot seat. I'm not saying that as a criticism towards President Obama, but as a reminder that all politics aside, to keep us safe in a dangerous world, sometimes the President needs the freedom to do things we find distasteful, unfair or "icky."