After posting a very shitty Foreign Affairs article that sucked at conspiracy debunking. Here is actually a good one. I have full access to the website there is a browser extension for that. But I am scared about copyright infringements. I will copy only some paragraphs.
www.foreignaffairs.com
First paragraph
The U.S. Supreme Court's decision on former President Donald Trump's claims of criminal immunity has provoked grave warnings about a new expansion of presidential power. On July 1, the Court ruled 6–3 along partisan lines that presidents are immune from criminal prosecution for "official acts" but found that they may still be prosecuted for unofficial acts. "The Court effectively creates a law-free zone around the President," wrote Justice Sonia Sotomayor in her dissent. "In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law."
Many commentators have echoed her critique. The ruling "jettisons the long-settled principle that presidents, like all others, are subject to the operation of law," observed the legal scholar Kate Shaw. "If the president is a king, then we are subjects, whose lives and livelihoods are only safe insofar as we don't incur the wrath of the executive," warned the New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie. "If Trump, as commander in chief, ordered his troops to assassinate somebody or stage a coup, that would seem to fall within the absolute immunity provision of the court's decision," explained the legal scholar Cheryl Bader. Judge Aileen Cannon's decision on July 15 to dismiss the charges against Trump for mishandling classified documents, while likely to be appealed and overturned, has added to the chorus of concerned voices.
What most analysts have failed to note, however, is that this lack of legal accountability for decisions by the U.S. president, including decisions to direct the military to use lethal force, is nothing new. It has long been the reality for most of the world outside the United States. For decades, American presidents have waged illegal wars, plotted to assassinate foreign leaders, unlawfully detained and tortured people, toppled democratic governments, and supported repressive regimes without any possibility of legal accountability in either domestic or international courts.
second paragraph.
The U.S. military participated in ongoing combat in Afghanistan for two decades and faced serious allegations of war crimes, including torture at a detention center at Bagram Air Base. Bagram was just one of several U.S. detention facilities at which detainees were tortured. The United States operated unlawful CIA "black sites" in several locations around the world, such as Kosovo, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Thailand, where it held and tortured detainees in secrecy.
Hundreds died in the 2011 war in Libya led by NATO with significant U.S. participation. Although the war was authorized by the UN Security Council, the U.S. Congress never approved U.S. participation in it. Two top administration lawyers advised that the U.S. law known as the War Powers Resolution required that the war cease after 60 days. President Barack Obama disregarded that advice, deciding instead to side with two other top administration lawyers who argued that the military operation in Libya did not amount to "hostilities" and therefore was not subject to that law.
Between 2021 and 2023, the U.S. government conducted counterterrorism operations in 78 countries, including ground combat missions in at least nine countries. Now with over 11,000 unmanned aircraft systems, the United States has the capacity to conduct airstrikes in much of the world with little notice. These systems, commonly known as drones, are generally used to target and kill suspected terrorists. In the recent past, those strikes included "signature strikes"—lethal strikes against people whose identity was unknown but whose observed behavior was consistent with that of terrorists. A target could include, for example, a male of military age carrying what appears to be a weapon in an area where fighting has taken place. In the last several years, the United States has conducted airstrikes in at least four countries. Most of these operations have been based on a tenuous reading of a law passed by Congress a week after the 9/11 attacks authorizing the president to use force against those who carried out the attacks and any country, organization, or persons who harbored them.
All these actions raise difficult legal questions about which there remains ongoing disagreement. U.S. government lawyers can and have come up with legal arguments to defend them—some more plausible than others. But few of these arguments have ever been made public or been tested in court.
I recommend reading the full article.
For the Rest of the World, the U.S. President Has Always Been Above the Law
Americans will now know what a lack of accountability means.
First paragraph
The U.S. Supreme Court's decision on former President Donald Trump's claims of criminal immunity has provoked grave warnings about a new expansion of presidential power. On July 1, the Court ruled 6–3 along partisan lines that presidents are immune from criminal prosecution for "official acts" but found that they may still be prosecuted for unofficial acts. "The Court effectively creates a law-free zone around the President," wrote Justice Sonia Sotomayor in her dissent. "In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law."
Many commentators have echoed her critique. The ruling "jettisons the long-settled principle that presidents, like all others, are subject to the operation of law," observed the legal scholar Kate Shaw. "If the president is a king, then we are subjects, whose lives and livelihoods are only safe insofar as we don't incur the wrath of the executive," warned the New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie. "If Trump, as commander in chief, ordered his troops to assassinate somebody or stage a coup, that would seem to fall within the absolute immunity provision of the court's decision," explained the legal scholar Cheryl Bader. Judge Aileen Cannon's decision on July 15 to dismiss the charges against Trump for mishandling classified documents, while likely to be appealed and overturned, has added to the chorus of concerned voices.
What most analysts have failed to note, however, is that this lack of legal accountability for decisions by the U.S. president, including decisions to direct the military to use lethal force, is nothing new. It has long been the reality for most of the world outside the United States. For decades, American presidents have waged illegal wars, plotted to assassinate foreign leaders, unlawfully detained and tortured people, toppled democratic governments, and supported repressive regimes without any possibility of legal accountability in either domestic or international courts.
second paragraph.
The U.S. military participated in ongoing combat in Afghanistan for two decades and faced serious allegations of war crimes, including torture at a detention center at Bagram Air Base. Bagram was just one of several U.S. detention facilities at which detainees were tortured. The United States operated unlawful CIA "black sites" in several locations around the world, such as Kosovo, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Thailand, where it held and tortured detainees in secrecy.
Hundreds died in the 2011 war in Libya led by NATO with significant U.S. participation. Although the war was authorized by the UN Security Council, the U.S. Congress never approved U.S. participation in it. Two top administration lawyers advised that the U.S. law known as the War Powers Resolution required that the war cease after 60 days. President Barack Obama disregarded that advice, deciding instead to side with two other top administration lawyers who argued that the military operation in Libya did not amount to "hostilities" and therefore was not subject to that law.
Between 2021 and 2023, the U.S. government conducted counterterrorism operations in 78 countries, including ground combat missions in at least nine countries. Now with over 11,000 unmanned aircraft systems, the United States has the capacity to conduct airstrikes in much of the world with little notice. These systems, commonly known as drones, are generally used to target and kill suspected terrorists. In the recent past, those strikes included "signature strikes"—lethal strikes against people whose identity was unknown but whose observed behavior was consistent with that of terrorists. A target could include, for example, a male of military age carrying what appears to be a weapon in an area where fighting has taken place. In the last several years, the United States has conducted airstrikes in at least four countries. Most of these operations have been based on a tenuous reading of a law passed by Congress a week after the 9/11 attacks authorizing the president to use force against those who carried out the attacks and any country, organization, or persons who harbored them.
All these actions raise difficult legal questions about which there remains ongoing disagreement. U.S. government lawyers can and have come up with legal arguments to defend them—some more plausible than others. But few of these arguments have ever been made public or been tested in court.
I recommend reading the full article.
