On: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity fo...

[demosthanos]

As noted by nostramo [0], Obama already set the precedent of ordering hits on US citizens. The answer to Sotomayor's concern here seems pretty obvious: if we're concerned that the President can order hits on US citizens for invalid reasons, then we need to be very clear in the laws that ordering hits on US citizens without due process is not within the President's official authority.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40849378

[kristjansson → demosthanos]

I don’t think this is a helpful comparison. A citizen in the service of an enemy engaged in war against his country does not enjoy the protections of an arbitrary citizen. We can rightly argue whether that theory wholly fits the facts of al-Awlaki, but it’s a very, very long bridge from that case to Sotomayor’s hypo

[demosthanos → kristjansson]

Not really—once you've crossed that bridge it's a short hop to the government arguing that the political rival was a terrorist who needed to be killed.

Due process is about validating the government's claims before allowing it to kill someone.

[jhp123 → demosthanos]

The President's authority to command the armed forces comes directly from the Constitution, Congress can't pass a law to take that away.

[salawat → jhp123]

Firther, Obama's AG argued successfully that due process was done; where the definition of due process became what the Executive Branch did.

I wouldn't have bought that; but alas, no one asked me.