Headline should read: Hersh to die in accidental plane soon.

Yeah, wouldn't surprise me in the least if that were true.

Seriously, does it make a difference at this point ?

Assassination is a fact of political life, when dealing with international relations. Almost as common as backstabbing to get a co-worker fired in the average office.

I'd actually be surprised if he wasn't.

Fox Force Five?
Deadly Viper Assassination Squad?

We need to avoid partisan withchunt. This is a mere policy difference.

he curved the bullets into that lawyer's face. tricky bastard.

from what he describes, that's not assassination, that's just murder. assassination and war are legitimate tools of state when executed with due process and oversight.

Man On Fire: from what he describes, that's not assassination, that's just murder.

tomato, tomahto.

I can't believe we had our own Department of Administrative Research. That's kinda badass.

/No way that's obscure.

I thought that stuff only existed in James Rollins books. Interesting.

Man On Fire: from what he describes, that's not assassination, that's just murder. assassination and war are legitimate tools of state when executed with due process and oversight.

Even with due process and oversight, it is still murder. I'm not saying it's not a valid tool of state, but assassination is murder, pure and simple.

Man On Fire: from what he describes, that's not assassination, that's just murder. assassination and war are legitimate tools of state when executed with due process and oversight.

Assassination ceases to be murder when committed with oversight and due process how exactly?

Benevolent Misanthrope: Assassination is a fact of political life, when dealing with international relations. Almost as common as backstabbing to get a co-worker fired in the average office.

Yeah, that's reaching for the high ground, there. "Hey, people just kill each other, you know? Stuff happens."

ninjakirby: Assassination ceases to be murder when committed with oversight and due process how exactly?

When its carried out by law? Assassination is the killing of a target for political or social reasons. It doesn't necessarily have to be an act of vigilantism.

DamnYankees: When its carried out by law? Assassination is the killing of a target for political or social reasons. It doesn't necessarily have to be an act of vigilantism.

You're still killing someone. Not saying its illegal, just that its still murder.

Though I guess "murder" is technically killing someone illegally. So hmph.

ninjakirby: Though I guess "murder" is technically killing someone illegally. So hmph.

There you go. That's the point. Assassination can still be immoral even if its legal.

47, you have a new target.

DamnYankees: There you go. That's the point. Assassination can still be immoral even if its legal.

I said Hmph!

Assassination is murder if we define murder as the premeditated killing of a human being. Interestingly, capital punishment also becomes murder.

BlindDog: Headline should read: Hersh to die in accidental plane soon.

Would he accidentally the whole plane?

Someone needs to tell Seymour that JSOC has existed for awhile and isn't a secret.

I know since this is on the politics page everybody is going to bring up the fact the Seymour Hersh may be dead soon, then some troll is going to bring up the morality of killing in relation to the republican party. And thats all fun and games but subby I just got done watching that freaking movie.

/And oh boy what a piece of crap it was.
//Bending bullets? Come on!

Lets see how far this rabbit hole goes. I have a feeling it will be occasional stories like this for the next 2-4 years as all thedust settles. I wonder who will take the fall in the end. This business sounds slightly prosecutable, but I am no lawyer.

I don't think we'll Seymour of Hersh.

gc.c: I know since this is on the politics page everybody is going to bring up the fact the Seymour Hersh may be dead soon, then some troll is going to bring up the morality of killing in relation to the republican party. And thats all fun and games but subby I just got done watching that freaking movie.

/And oh boy what a piece of crap it was.
//Bending bullets? Come on!

It's worth watching just to hear Morgan Freeman say "shoot this motha f*cka".

If he couldn't assassinate that pheasant (or his apparent secondary target of an old man), then I have serious doubts about his skill.

BlindDog: Headline should read: Hersh to die in accidental plane soon.

That's even worse than dying in a purposeful plane.

This is gonna get ugly. Now that it's out, there is going to be an investigation into who got assassinated at the direction of the Vice-President. You can't hear from Seymour Hersh, the man with the most trustworthy sources of any reporter in Washington, that the Vice-President has had oversight over political assassinations and not immediately ask, who? How many?

At the very least, there will be rampant speculation over which deaths over the past 8 years, of any prominent figures, were potentially political assassinations ordered directly by the executive branch of the United States. People have speculated so much about the CIA, it loses its immediacy and credibility, there is the protection of bureaucracy, the idea that maybe someone wasn't following orders. Not so when the orders are openly directly from the executive branch.

This has the potential to be the most embarrassing and retrospectively reputation-ruining episode of the entire Bush presidency, even worse than Abu Ghraib. We knew the Bush administration was committing torture and that people died in their custody from torture. We knew that people have been unlawfully rendered to third countries and some have disappeared. We knew there was a war launched and as a result hundreds of thousands of people have died. We did not know Cheney was having people whacked.

Benevolent Misanthrope: Assassination is a fact of political life, when dealing with international relations. Almost as common as backstabbing to get a co-worker fired in the average office.

Hmm this is what we call paranoia. Maybe it happens sometimes, when multiple governments either agree a person is a threat, or that governments are on the verge of war anyhow. But nations are too complicated for one person to pose a threat, and just offing one or two leaders won't normally stop a threat to national security that is credible.

There is a reason Stalin, Henry VIII and Caligula are considered madmen. ...Henry a little less mad, more of an empowered neurotic, I suppose....

You know what this reminds me of? All of the people I told back in 2005 that if we really wanted Saddam out of power we should have just assassinated him. Oh how they laughed "we don't do stuff like that anymore in this country." But who's a stupid 15 year old NOW?!

As dark and dastardly as these sorts of black ops sound, I would much rather see things done this way instead of with bombs or miltary incursions. No kids asploded, bad guy down,

What's the problem if targets are selected for good solid reasons of national security and the ops performed by our best?

Oh wait, never mind. This was the Bush administration. Which means they probably selected targets with a dartboard and sent some Pioneers and Liberty U interns off to take care of it.

hyperspacemonkey: But nations are too complicated for one person to pose a threat, and just offing one or two leaders won't normally stop a threat to national security that is credible.

Who said anything about targeting political leaders?

And what would you call arranging for a 'work accident' to befall an explosives engineer, or the like, other than an assassination? Ditto for the Predator strikes, although I think those are primarily CIA.

Somebody exploded Mughniyah, for instance. Given that the man had numerous enemies, and many of them wouldn't shrink at using car bombs, there's no single obvious suspect -- but the US sure had a motive.

Seymour needs to get his meds adjusted.

bobbette: We did not know Cheney was having people whacked.

On the plus side Cheney might be getting locked up and or face international trial. The future implications of this for the current admin are going to be messy. When this steaming bucket of shiat hits the wind machine our president is going to be looking at a gargantuan mess. The last administration was suspected to be, and is now showing proven to be absolutely criminal in its actions. And this is only after a few months, imagine years down the road how much we will know about how much the Bush regime farked up. Inquiries, trials, eliminating these [assumedly] ongoing programs, going to be hard to save face to the world.

i bet they didn't even have an umbrella-man on the team. losers.

WTF? Seymour Hersh is such a f*cking douchebag lately.

JSOC is not an "executive assassination ring", and they sure as HELL aren't particular to the Bush Administration. JSOC is a "tier 1" special operations asset, IE: they are the absolute best of the best of our Special Operations Forces and they do all of the really really sensitive covert and clandestine operations work.

As in years passed, a core mission they undertake is Direct Action. Direct Action is, drumroll, kicking in doors and killing people. If you want to malign them as "an executive assassin ring" then you might as well call all of the military "executive assassins" because that's what we do on a daily basis in Iraq and Afghanistan.

By shifting the context of the actions, Seymour Hersh is trying to portray their job in a more sinister light. This is just like when he tried to say that the Bush administration was "making plans to invade Iran" when the only thing that was actually happening was a minor update to the contingency plans we have for invading EVERY COUNTRY. ALL OF WHICH are continuously updated.

bobbette: Seymour Hersh, the man with the most trustworthy sources of any reporter in Washington

The man who said it was a lock we were going to invade Iran?

The writer whose sources' names curiously don't seem to come up in his articles unless they're already in lockstep with Hersh's worldview?

Hersh gets scoops sometimes, but he also gets hung out to dry like he has on Iran because he relies on way too many anonymous and unverifiable sources.

TFA is full of material that's "too good to check".

Gulper Eel: bobbette: Seymour Hersh, the man with the most trustworthy sources of any reporter in Washington

The man who said it was a lock we were going to invade Iran?

The writer whose sources' names curiously don't seem to come up in his articles unless they're already in lockstep with Hersh's worldview?

Hersh gets scoops sometimes, but he also gets hung out to dry like he has on Iran because he relies on way too many anonymous and unverifiable sources.

TFA is full of material that's "too good to check".

Hersh is absolutely off his goddamn rocker, this is slanderous. JSOC is a serious and highly professional group of people. Hersh sounds more like he's setting the scene for an action movie than reporting on who and what they actually are and do. His "source" must be Eric Haney, or some schizo he met under a bridge.

whatever happened a while back when some author came out and said the CIA forged some sorta letter that was used as a pretense to go to Iraq.. who was that and why did that go nowhere?

BlindDog: Headline should read: Hersh to die in accidental plane soon.


Or "Hersh dies due to self-inflicted airstrike."

depmode98: whatever happened a while back when some author came out and said the CIA forged some sorta letter that was used as a pretense to go to Iraq.. who was that and why did that go nowhere?

Here, let me Google that for you...

Is it bad that I hear loom of fate and my first thought is Mage: The Ascension?

/prefered Werewolf, like our Weaver did.

Assassins.

They are needed. And assassin movies are the best.

'The Professional' FTW.

James F. Campbell: Assassination is murder if we define murder as the premeditated killing of a human being. Interestingly, capital punishment also becomes murder.

The death certificates of criminals executed for capital crimes list the cause of death as "homocide." It's always been that way.

ninjakirby: Assassination ceases to be murder when committed with oversight and due process how exactly?

Operation Vengeance

depmode98: whatever happened a while back when some author came out and said the CIA forged some sorta letter that was used as a pretense to go to Iraq.. who was that and why did that go nowhere?

After digging through layers and layers of wikis on the Habbush letter, I found this source.

Basically, the people who Ron Suskind quotes as sources for his allegation deny the claim and that they ever told Suskind that.

And now, thanks to you, I have to go dig back through all those wikis and update them to reflect this. At 1:07 in the f*cking morning. Otherwise I'm an irresponsible asshole netizen. Thanks, dickweed.

BlindDog: Headline should read: Hersh to die in accidental plane soon.

He accidentally a plane?