[lbo-talk] Death Panels

[John E. Norem]

(Reuters) - American militants like Anwar al-Awlaki are placed on a kill 
or capture list by a secretive panel of senior government officials, 
which then informs the president of its decisions, according to officials.

There is no public record of the operations or decisions of the panel, 
which is a subset of the White House's National Security Council, 
several current and former officials said. Neither is there any law 
establishing its existence or setting out the rules by which it is 
supposed to operate.

The panel was behind the decision to add Awlaki, a U.S.-born militant 
preacher with alleged al Qaeda connections, to the target list. He was 
killed by a CIA drone strike inYemen 
<http://www.reuters.com/places/yemen>late last month.

The role of the president in ordering or ratifying a decision to target 
a citizen is fuzzy. White House spokesman Tommy Vietor declined to 
discuss anything about the process.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/06/us-cia-killlist-idUSTRE79475C20111006

-- 
Adorno: "And in that sense the difference between thinking
and eating roast goose is not so very great. The one thing
can stand in for the other."

Horkheimer: "But eating roast goose is not the same thing
as doing theory."