Mike Maden - Drone

“Third, the WPR only requires the president to report to Congress the deployment of U.S. forces abroad within forty-eight hours, not request permission to deploy those forces. For the record, no U.S. military personnel have been dispatched to Mexico, only unmanned drone systems, so by definition, the WPR once again does not apply.”

“You’re splitting hairs on that one,” Diele insisted. “American drones are being flown by American personnel, even if they are located in Fort Huachuca, Arizona.”

“We’re both lawyers, Senator. Splitting hairs is what we do best.”

A laugh rolled through the gallery. Diele lightly tapped his gavel.

“But the most important point is this. President Myers did not seek the advice and consent of Congress prior to this action because she believes Congress is increasingly irrelevant to any of the solutions this nation needs, including the present crisis. In fact, Congress is the cause of many of the crises we face.”

The gallery exploded with cheers and applause, and a scattering of boos. Some senators threw up their hands in disgust; others applauded. A few grabbed their microphones and began shouting at one another. Diele gaveled the room into silence under penalty of expulsion.

“For the record, Ms. Lancet, you are aware of the doctrine of the separation of powers? The three separate and distinct branches of government? It comes from that pesky little document known as the Constitution of the United States.”

“I am indeed, sir. So is the president. Her desire is that the Senate and the House live up to the responsibilities of their respective institutions. Case in point. President Obama launched over three hundred drone strikes against Pakistan in his first term in office—also a sovereign, independent nation like Mexico—and not a single congressional vote was ever taken on any one of those strikes. In fact, since the first known drone strike in 2004, at least forty-seven hundred people have been killed.”

“Those drone strikes were conducted under the AUMF,” Diele insisted.

“But there was no AUMF for Libya when President Obama committed American drones to combat in Libya—another sovereign nation, by the way—for the purpose of helping to topple the existing government, which, ironically, was an American ally in the fight against al-Qaeda. The Libyan action was not an act of self-defense, no American lives were at risk, no treaty commitments to an ally were invoked. More to the point, no congressional approval was apparently needed, nor was congressional interest aroused in the slightest. By your definition, President Obama invaded a sovereign state and did it without a declaration of war, which, under the separation of powers doctrine, is your assigned constitutional responsibility.”

Myers’s supporters on the committee applauded, as did a number of people in the gallery. Diele gaveled them quiet. Lancet continued.

“The United States has not declared a war since 1941, but the litany of conflicts we’ve been in—‘wars’ by any other name that involve the loss of American lives—is incredible: the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the first and second Gulf wars are just the big ones. There were twice as many covert operations that were no less acts of war, including a dozen coups d’état in Asia and Latin America during the hottest years of the cold war. So the president’s question for you, Senator, is why has Congress been so interested in fighting wars over the past seven decades but not in declaring them?”

“The president should be worried about fulfilling the legal responsibilities of her office, not lecturing us on how to conduct our affairs.”

“Her legal responsibility is to protect and defend the nation. This nation has suffered grievously for a lack of leadership, particularly from Congress. She hasn’t tried to avoid the Constitution, Senator, she’s trying to invoke it. You know the numbers as well as anyone: drugs have killed far more Americans than any foreign enemy from any war we’ve ever fought. And what have you done about it?”

Diele banged his gavel.

“You will show respect to this committee or you will be held in contempt.”

“Mr. Chairman, you first came to Washington over thirty years ago. What was the national debt when you arrived? What was our balance of trade? What was the annual budget deficit? What was the price of the average home? How much did it cost to educate a child? How much was a gallon of gas? Please name for us, for the record, one significant social problem this Congress has not exacerbated, let alone resolved.”

Diele banged the gavel again and again as the gallery howled with delight.

“I am going to hold you in contempt, Attorney General Lancet, if you don’t control your tongue.”

“As every public opinion poll has demonstrated for the last twenty years, sir, the American people already hold Congress in contempt. For the sake of the Republic, and for the legitimacy of this institution, it’s time for you to help us fight and win this horrific war being waged against our cities, our culture, our children. Help us—or get out of the damn way.”

Lancet grabbed her satchel and stormed past the cheering gallery that stood and clapped for her defiant performance as she marched toward the exit.

Diele banged his gavel in vain, trying to call the hearing back to order. When his colleagues began to rise and quit the room, he banged the gavel again and announced the hearing dismissed until further notice, but the damage had already been done.

The television cameras caught everything, just as Diele had hoped. He just hadn’t planned on getting his ass handed to him by a Junior Leaguer like Lancet.

Fortunately for Diele, there was one man who had watched the entire scene with a great deal of interest. Ambassador Britnev had the weapon Diele needed to bring Myers down, and he was sure that the broken old man he saw on his television screen would be desperate enough to use it.

Yucatán Peninsula, near Peto, Mexico

Victor Bravo complained that he hadn’t had a beer in a week.

He and his men had been hiding from the American satellites swinging overhead in an abandoned mission compound and he couldn’t exactly run down to the local mercado and restock the refrigerator.

Eleazar Medina took Victor’s thirst as a sign from God.

Raised in a devoutly evangelical home in rural Guatemala, Eleazar was one of fourteen children of a lay Foursquare Gospel minister in a remote village in the north. All of the Medina children had been forced to memorize whole books of the Bible, but 2 Samuel was a favorite of Eleazar’s because it was the passage of the Old Testament from whence he had gotten his name. “Eleazar, son of Dodo” was one of David’s “mighty men of valor,” and little Eleazar’s skinny brown chest puffed out three sizes larger every time he recited it boastfully to his childhood friends.

But that had been a long time ago, and Eleazar was a different person now, one of Bravo’s most trusted lieutenants. He’d done terrible things for Bravo, things for which he’d often prayed for forgiveness, but the guilt always remained. He could never quite get the feeling that the blood on his hands had been washed off even though the blood he’d shed had been, well, necessary, hadn’t it?

As soon as Bravo had said he wanted a beer, a familiar verse came back to Eleazar: Y David dijo con vehemencia: ¡Quién me diera a beber del agua del pozo de Belén que está junto a la puerta!

Eleazar remembered that the verse was from 2 Samuel 23:15. And didn’t his father always say, God always makes a way of escape?

There was no question in Eleazar’s mind that God was opening a door for true forgiveness for him, if he would just have the courage to step through it. Just like Victor Bravo, King David was hiding in his wilderness stronghold in the midst of his enemies when he longed for a drink from a faraway well. And wasn’t Eleazar, son of Dodo, one of the three mighty men who fetched it for him?