in OUR name!

“… any admission or denial of these allegations by defendants in this case would reveal the means and methods employed pursuant to this clandestine program and such a revelation would present a grave risk of injury to national security."
[U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III, dismissing Khaled al-Masri's suit against the C.I.A. Mr. al-Masri was wrongfully kidnapped, sent to secret facility in Afghanistan, held for six months... a result of mistaken identity.]

A government that hides its acts behind the cloak of “national security” can only with difficulty claim to derive its power from the informed “consent of the governed.” An Executive that continually hides behind this cloak is not in any meaningful way subject to Legislative or Judicial restraint.

I am far from a Constitutional scholar, being only a private citizen who takes seriously the lessons he learned in eighth-grade Civics. I note that the Constitution was ordained and established by, “We, the people of the United States,” and that the term “national security” does not appear anywhere in the text. The “the security of a free State” is cited as the justification for the right to bear arms in the 2nd Amendment, in this context presumably granting citizens power against the government (though I suspect the devilish ambiguity is deliberate, allowing both Madison & Hamilton to claim victory). Amendments V, VI, & VIII seem to preclude “extraordinary rendition” and torture.