Jenkinson: independent court needed for drone strikes

The US has a long history of assassinating its enemies, even when the targets are Americans.

Clay Jenkinson is the Theodore Roosevelt Center scholar at Dickinson State University, Distinguished Scholar of the Humanities at Bismarck State College and director of the Dakota Institute. His radio show, The Thomas Jefferson Hour® can be heard Sundays on KRCC, Radio Colorado College.

He writes a weekly column in the Bismarck Tribune. From today's piece:

If George W. Bush or Dick Cheney were ordering these strikes, the outcry — at home and abroad — would be deafening. The president should be required by law to get specific authorization for such a strike from an independent court, like the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that determine which foreigners may be surveilled within the United States.

And after every such execution, even it was specifically authorized, an independent review panel should evaluate the president’s actions to determine if the termination was justified. In addition to all of that, a carefully selected congressional committee should review every summary execution of American citizens or, for that matter, foreign nationals who are assassinated away from actual battle sites.

Jenkinson as President Jefferson could answer a question from this interested party on today's radio show:

Larry,

I shall share with His Eminence and we will see how forthcoming he is on the subject. Thanks for listening, and writing!

David Borlaug, President, Lewis and Clark Fort Mandan Foundation, TJH Producer