Professors: It"s Not Okay To Be White

Authored by Scott Greer via The Daily Caller,

“Can my children be friends with white people?”

This bizarre question is the basis of a New York Times op-ed published Sunday, and the author answers it with a “no,” albeit with some exceptions.

“History has provided little reason for people of color to trust white people in this way [of genuine friendship], and these recent months have put in the starkest relief the contempt with which the country measures the value of racial minorities,” writes Ekow N. Yankah, a law professor at Yeshiva University.

WATCH CNN COMMENTATOR CALL TRUMP A WHITE SUPREMACIST:

According to Yankah, examples of white “contempt” for racial minorities in recent months include concerns over the opioid epidemic, worries over rising unemployment among working-class whites, and criticism of NFL players kneeling for the anthem. Apparently those issues receive far more attention than the woes of African-Americans, thus revealing the secret disdain whites have for non-whites.

With that conclusion assumed, Yankah declares the lesson he will teach his kids.

“As against our gauzy national hopes, I will teach my boys to have profound doubts that friendship with white people is possible,” the law professor argues.

 

“When they ask, I will teach my sons that their beautiful hue is a fault line. Spare me platitudes of how we are all the same on the inside. I first have to keep my boys safe, and so I will teach them before the world shows them this particular brand of rending, violent, often fatal betrayal.”

Throughout the article, Yankah bases this pessimistic attitude not on personal experience — he says his childhood hometown was remarkably free of racial tension — but on Donald Trump being president and the violence in Charlottesville.

A large number of white people voting for Trump is the final push in giving up on Caucasians.

“Of course, the rise of this president has broken bonds on all sides. But for people of color the stakes are different. Imagining we can now be friends across this political line is asking us to ignore our safety and that of our children, to abandon personal regard and self-worth,” the professor asserts.

 

“Only white people can cordon off Mr. Trump’s political meaning, ignore the “unpleasantness” from a position of safety. His election and the year that has followed have fixed the awful thought in my mind too familiar to black Americans: ‘You can’t trust these people.”

He also attacks liberals who don’t protest enough or dare to criticize the excesses of racial activism as marked off from friendship.

While Yankah sounds exceptionally grim in his article on interracial friendship, he admits near the end that he has still lots of white friends and his biracial wife passes as Caucasian. Those facts undermine the seriousness of Yankah’s argument, but his intention is clearly not advocating for the total forsaking of interracial friendship.

It’s just another article attempting to shame whites for being, well, white. Yankah counts on The New York Times’ liberal audience to sympathize with his argument and ask themselves what more can they do for radicals like this law professor.

Voting for Democrats isn’t enough. Being a good neighbor to non-whites isn’t enough. Showing no sign of racism isn’t enough.

You must use all your time and energy protesting Trump and advocating for the Black Lives Matter agenda in order to earn trust from non-whites. Otherwise, you’re in the same league as those irredeemable Trump voters.

The deeper meaning of Yankah’s article is that whiteness is itself the 21st century’s Mark of Cain. Bearing that skin color means one is born with the taint of sin from historical injustices and present election outcomes.

One can only atone for this inherent evil by trying to be the wokest white dude possible, and never criticize the actions of those who don’t bear this awful color.

It’s a crazy concept that undermines the last 60 some years of teaching on race. Race is taught to be a social construct that we’re supposed to be getting over with time. You’re not supposed to judge someone by the color of their skin but by their individual character, according to the old consensus.

Columns like Yankah’s shows the reverse of that, pedestaling race as the chief factor in judging another person. And whites come out the worst in this process.

It’s worth remembering that Yankah is professor, and students are indoctrinated with similar messages on a regular basis as my book, “No Campus for White Men,” documents.

When views similar to the Yeshiva law professor’s are the norm, it’s no surprise that such a simple statement as “it’s okay to be white” causes such an uproar on campus.

Spurred on by 4chan, anonymous students have been posting signs declaring it’s okay to be white on campuses across the country. Not that’s it’s better to be white or that it’s great to be white. Simply that it’s okay to be Caucasian.

Those messages, instead of being ignored, have triggered university administrators and campus leftists into seeing the postings as outbursts of dangerous racism.

Marcia L. Sells, Harvard Law School dean, warned in a typical reaction to the messages that they were attempting to divide the university.

“HLS [Harvard Law School] will not let that happen here. We live, work, teach, and learn together in a community that is stronger, better, and deeper because of our diversity and because we encourage open, respectful, and constructive discourse,” Sells wrote in an email to students.

The overreaction to these rather benign posters sends the message that it is not okay to be white. Ignoring them as pranks would mean that schools accept “it’s okay to be white” as so basic that it would be like proudly boasting it’s okay to be left-handed.

But the meltdowns from campus activists and all-too serious concern from school deans means that there is something inherently wrong in stating it’s alright to be white.

With opinions like Yankah’s receiving a platform from America’s paper of record, more people should wake up to how a large percentage of higher education is teaching there’s something inherently wrong with one particular skin color.

Does that sound like an idea that will lead to more harmony in the country?

NSA Whistleblower Says Trump Pushed Meeting With Pompeo

As we reported yesterday, President Donald Trump is receiving flack from hysterical liberals for reportedly advising CIA Director Mike Pompeo to meet with former senior NSA official Bill Binney, whom the media has labeled a conspiracy theorist for his belief that Russia wasn’t responsible for hacking the DNC - or at least, if it was, it was the work of a deep-cover agent - because the files, according to Binney, were manually loaded onto a thumb drive, meaning the theft was likely the work of a disgruntled insider.

Binney discussed the meeting during an appearance on NBC, where he confirmed that Trump was probably made aware of his theory by watching one of his appearances on Fox News.

"He"s trying to find some factual evidence," said Bill Binney, a former code-breaker at the National Security Agency.

Binney, a widely respected NSA whistleblower, left the agency in 2000 and has made claims that the NSA is capturing and storing nearly every US communication.

Binney told NBC News that Pompeo informed him that the CIA director took the meeting at the urging of the president.

Mike Pompeo

In a statement, a CIA spokeswoman did not dispute that, but declined to comment.

“The Director stands by and has always stood by the January 2017 intelligence community assessment," on Russian election interference, spokeswoman Nicole de Haay said.

She added, “The director has been adamant that CIA officers have the time, space and resources to make sound and unbiased assessments that are delivered to policy makers without fear or favor."

The intelligence community released a multilateral report in January 2017 concluding that Russia had sought to interfere in the 2016 election, which was won by Trump in a historic upset. One of the tactics, the intelligence community alleged, was the hack of the DNC, which was a massive public relations embarrassment for Clinton and eventually led to the resignation of former DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

Trump has repeatedly criticized the intelligence community and claimed its conclusion is unfounded. And Pompeo, a former Army officer and Harvard Law School graduate who gives Trump his intelligence briefing nearly every day, is suspected of kowtowing to Trump in his tepid approach to the issue.

Last month, the CIA had to correct Pompeo"s erroneous statement that the intelligence assessment found that the Russian interference campaign did not alter the outcome of the election. No such conclusion was made.

NBC pointed out that it is extremely unusual for a CIA director to meet with someone like Binney, who for years has accused US intelligence agencies of subverting the constitution and violating the civil rights of Americans. However, Binney - while a controversial figure in the US - has been praised abroad as a whistle blower and truth teller.

However, the meeting to discuss the narrative that directly contravenes the findings of the US intelligence community was so productive that Pompeo is already arranging further meetings between NSA and FBI officials and Binney to discuss his analysis. Binney said two unnamed CIA analysts accompanied Pompeo during the meeting at CIA headquarters.

Binney reportedly also raised the death of DNC staffer Seth Rich as a suspicious, given its proximity to the release of the hacked documents. There has been speculation that Rich was the one who leaked the emails.

Binney said he did not discuss with Pompeo his longstanding allegations that U.S. intelligence agencies have been acting illegally. Binney said he voted for Trump, because he considered Democrat Hillary Clinton "a war monger.

Osama Bin Laden’s Brother Arrested In Saudi Crackdown

Among the numerous high-profile figures arrested overnight in Saudi Arabia on “anti-corruption” charges, in addition to the shocking detention of prince Alwalaleed bin-Talal another unexpected name has emerged: that of Bakr bin Laden, chairman of Saudi Binladin Group and brother of Osama bin Laden. The Binladin Group is one of the biggest construction companies, with an annual turnover of $30 billion. It was carrying out the expansion of the Kaaba complex.

Bakr bin Laden

The family rejected al-Qaeda"s former leader, Osama Bin Ladin, because he was involved in terrorist activities in the 1990s. A quick primer on the Binladin Group from the WSJ:

Based in Jeddah and [ZH: formerly] favored by Saudi Arabia"s royal family, Saudi Binladin Group derives billions in annual revenue from a wide range of enterprises, including mosque construction, telecommunications and selling Snapple soft drinks in Saudi Arabia. Although the family"s U.S. spokesman says Saudi Binladin Group is wholly owned by the extended bin Laden family, not including Osama, he said he could provide no information on exactly which members have an equity interest in the company.

 

British paging company Multitone Electronics PLC said it was shocked to learn that its reseller in Saudi Arabia, Baud Telecommunications Ltd., is owned by the Binladin Group. "You"re joking," Chief Executive Michael Walker said. "Oh bloody! I didn"t know. I thought it was just Baud Telecom."

 

* * * 

 

The family has donated to colleges, Islamic organizations and other nonprofit causes in both England and the U.S. Abdullah, one of Mr. bin Laden"s brothers, received a master"s degree in law from Harvard Law School in 1992.

 

Two years later, on a fundraising trip to the Middle East, the law school"s dean made a pitch to another brother, Sheik Bakr Mohammed bin Laden, chairman of the family group. Bakr and the group subsequently donated $1 million to the law school, half for a visiting scholars program and half for financial aid for law students from the Muslim world. The family also gave $1 million to Harvard"s Graduate School of Design in 1993.

 

Robert Clark, the law school dean, said the gift was intended "to promote mutual understanding between scholars trained in Islamic legal systems and those trained in Western legal systems. We need that more than ever."

 

Still, outside the Arab world, the Binladin name has become an increasing liability. Until a year and a half ago, the group had a prominent storefront on the main street of Astana in the new Kazakhstan, with a contract to create the city"s master plan. Then, although the Kazak government believed the company"s assurances that it was not linked to Mr. bin Laden, President Nursultan Nazarbayev dropped the company just in case someone got the wrong idea, a government official said.

 

In 1999, the group changed the name of its telecommunications division from Binladin to Baud. John Dickson, a Baud manager, says the switch reflects a desire to choose a more modern name. Baud means distance in Arabic, and in English it is a measurement of speed.

As the WSJ concluded back in 2001, "In the Arab world the Binladin name is looked upon with "absolute reverence - like IBM."

Not any more, even though the reason why the Binladen chairman has fallen out of grace with the Saudi royalty has yet to be determined.

As a reminder, a total of eleven princes, four current ministers and dozens of former ministers were among those who were detained. A list of those detained includes:

• Bakr bin Laden, chairman of Saudi Binladin Group;


• Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, chairman of Kingdom Holding;


• Prince Miteb bin Abdullah, minister of the National Guard;


• Prince Turki bin Abdullah, former governor of Riyadh province;


• Khalid al-Tuwaijri, former chief of the Royal Court;


• Adel Fakeih, Minister of Economy and Planning;


• Ibrahim al-Assaf, former finance minister;


• Abdullah al-Sultan, commander of the Saudi navy;


• Mohammad al-Tobaishi, former head of protocol at the Royal Court;


• Amr al-Dabbagh, former governor of Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority;


• Alwaleed al-Ibrahim, owner of television network MBC;


• Khalid al-Mulheim, former director-general at Saudi Arabian Airlines;


• Saoud al-Daweesh , former chief executive of Saudi Telecom;


• Prince Turki bin Nasser, former head of the Presidency of Meteorology and Environment;


• Prince Fahad bin Abdullah bin Mohammad al-Saud, former deputy defence minister;


• Saleh Kamel, businessman;


• Mohammad al-Amoudi, businessman;

As reported overnight, many of the detainees were held at the opulent Ritz-Carlton hotel in the diplomatic quarter of Riyadh. The hotel’s exterior gate was shuttered on Sunday morning and guards turned away a Reuters reporter, saying it had been closed for security reasons though private cars and ambulances were seen entering through a rear entrance. Ironically, the hotel and an adjacent facility were the site of an international conference promoting Saudi Arabia as an investment destination just 10 days ago attended by at least one of those now being held for questioning.

People on Twitter applauded the arrests of certain ministers with some comparing them to Germany"s “the night of the long knives.” The arrest orders came from an anti-corruption committee just hours after the King Salman issued a Royal Decree to form the committee, which is headed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The new body was given broad powers to investigate cases, issue arrest warrants and travel restrictions, and seize assets. “The homeland will not exist unless corruption is uprooted and the corrupt are held accountable,” the royal decree said.

As Reuters adds, the line between public funds and royal money is not always clear in Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy ruled by an Islamic system in which law is not systematically codified and no elected parliament exists. WikiLeaks has detailed the huge monthly stipends that every Saudi royal receives as well as various money-making schemes some have used to finance lavish lifestyles. In September the king announced that a ban on women driving would be lifted, while Prince Mohammed is trying to break decades of conservative tradition by promoting public entertainment and visits by foreign tourists.

Analysts say the arrests were another pre-emptive measure by the crown prince to remove powerful figures as he exerts control over the world’s leading oil exporter. Others have speculated that the move was a "countercoup" similar to that conducted in June by crown prince Mohammad bin Salman to cement his control on Saudi power.

The royal decree said the arrests were in response to “exploitation by some of the weak souls who have put their own interests above the public interest, in order to, illicitly, accrue money.”

The real reason behind the arrests: to shore up power, remove even more potential opponents and threats, all under the guise of cracking down on corruption, a page taken right out Xi Jinping playbook as he sought to - and eventually became last month"s - China"s quasi emperor.

The most recent crackdown breaks with the tradition of consensus within the ruling family, wrote James Dorsey, a senior fellow at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies.

 

“Prince Mohammed, rather than forging alliances, is extending his iron grip to the ruling family, the military, and the National Guard to counter what appears to be more widespread opposition within the family as well as the military to his reforms and the Yemen war,” he said. Scholar Joseph Kechichian said the interests of the Al Saud, however, would remain protected.

 

“Both King Salman and heir apparent Mohammed bin Salman are fully committed to them. What they wish to instill, and seem determined to execute, is to modernize the ruling establishment, not just for the 2030 horizon but beyond it too,” he said.

Yet while Xi Jinping"s demi-god status is safe - at least until China"s middle class revolts - that of Mohammed bin Salman may be far more precarious in the coming weeks, especially if he overestimated his power and influence, and the two consecutive countercoups ultimately lead to precisely what he fears the most: a coup - either peaceful or not so much - that ultimately removes him from power.

Scaramucci Listed As Dead In Latest Harvard Alumni Directory

It was a bad day for Anthony Scaramucci: first the Mooch was fired just ten days after he was first hired, in the brief process getting served with divorce papers and missing the birth of his baby while unleashing a bizarre rant for the ages, and then shortly after, his now former boss, the president of the US, the same one who earlier said there was no chaos at the White House, tweeted that it was "A great day at the White House"

In this case, one of the responses to the Trump tweet was substantially more informative than the original:

In 10 days you destroyed @Scaramucci’s hedge fund, his career, his marriage, and made him miss the birth of his child.
 
Then you fired him.

— Jules Suzdaltsev (@jules_su) July 31, 2017

And then, adding insult to pink slip, CBS reported that Harvard Law School apologized for erroneously listing Anthony Scaramucci as dead in its new alumni directory.

No, really: a directory mailed to alumni this week included an asterisk by the name of Scaramucci, a 1989 graduate of the Cambridge, Massachusetts, university, indicating he had died.

A statement from the law school apologizes for the error and says it will be corrected in future editions. It doesn"t provide an explanation for the error. The directory is published every five years and is available only to alumni of the Ivy League law school.

If there was any consolation for Scaramucci, it came from People Magazine, which reported that the lawyer representing the estranged wife of ousted White House communications director denied the NY Post report that the couple ended their marriage because of President Trump.

"I don’t know where that came from, but it is not accurate. It is a false fact,” divorce lawyer Jill Stone, who represents Deidre Ball, told People magazine on Monday.

So at least that wasn"t Trump"s fault. And now that he is once again out of the public eye, Scaramucci may finally get what he requested just 48 hours ago: a plea to leave his family out of it.

Leave civilians out of this. I can take the hits, but I would ask that you would put my family in your thoughts and prayers & nothing more.

— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) July 28, 2017

To top off an emotional day for all, here is some humor from The Onion:

Following his abrupt dismissal just 10 days after being named White House communications director, Anthony Scaramucci reportedly received an outpouring of sympathetic texts Monday from friends and family expressing that they were “so fuckin’ sorry to hear about this shit.”

“My deepest motherfuckin’ condolences, Tony, it’s terrible to hear you got shit-canned by these ass-munching cocks in D.C.,” read a text message in part, just one of dozens sent by old buddies at Goldman Sachs, current business partners at SkyBridge Capital, and extended family in New Jersey in response to his “goddamn bullshit” dismissal.

“Sorry to hear those bitches gave you the fucking ax, Mooch. That jackass [John] Kelly got no fucking clue what a good fuckin’ dude you are. Just know your mother and I always got your fucking back.” At press time, Scaramucci’s New York office was reportedly filled with flower arrangements and handwritten cards lamenting that this was “absolute fucking trash.”

Meet DOJ's Rachel Brand: She'll Be A Russian Spy By Next Week

Before this morning, most people in the United States had never heard of Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand.  But, an ABC story (which we covered here) suggesting that Acting Attorney General Rod Rosenstein may have to recuse himself from overseeing Special Counsel Mueller"s Russia probe, and that Brand would be the next inline to step into that position, changed all that.

So what do we know about Rachel Brand?  Well, we know 4 things with absolute certainty:

1. She was appointed by the Trump administration and confirmed on May 18, 2017


2. She is an active contributor to Republican campaigns


3. Democrats hate her


4. Therefore, by the transitive property, we also know with absolute certainty she is a Russian spy

This is how ABC described Brand:

As for Brand, she previously led the Justice Department"s Office of Legal Policy, and she most recently served as a member of the government"s Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board. She graduated from Harvard Law School and clerked for Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, according to the Justice Department.

Sessions recently said she "has proven herself to be a brilliant lawyer."

"She is also a dedicated public servant who is strongly committed to upholding the rule of law and our Constitution," he added.

Of course, a couple of quick internet searches revealed far more "suspicious" discoveries...

First, Brand is clearly a Conservative and has been an active contributor to several Republican campaigns in recent years, including "Ted Cruz For President" and "Ted Cruz For Senate."

Moreover, Democrats hate her as evidenced by the fact that she was only confirmed in the Senate via a 52-46 vote along party lines...

...and Senator Elizabeth Warren"s opposition speech in which Brand was "branded" as just another greedy capitalist:

“...has extensive experience, years of experience, fighting on behalf of the biggest and richest companies in the world.”

Finally, since Democrats have been hyper sensitive, in recent hearings, to the Acting Attorney General"s authority to fire Special Counsel Mueller...

...an authority which could soon be passed to Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand, it"s only logical to conclude that Democrats and the Washington Post will spend the weekend telling you why Rachel Brand is most likely a Russian spy.

So, what"s the over/under on how many days it takes Brand to recuse herself...two?  Four?

Online Observers Accuse Obama Of Improper Intervention In Hawaii Immigration Ruling

Via Disobedient Media

An unannounced trip that Barack Obama took to Hawaii just days before a ruling from a Honolulu federal judge on Donald Trump"s new immigration restrictions has lead to accusations of improper meddling as observers noted that Obama at one point may have been within five minutes of U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson"s house.

On March 13, 2017, local Hawaiian news station KHON2 published pictures indicating that Barack and Michelle Obama had made an unannounced trip  to Oahu after one of their viewers submitted photos of Obama at Buzz"s Original Steak House in Lanikai. The paper reported that Obama spent March 14th playing golf in at the Midway Golf Club in Kailua before joining "friends" in a private room at Noi Thai Cuisine at Royal Hawaiian Center for dinner. There was no information on the identity of the individuals Obama dined with. Online users have noted that the most direct path from Kailua to Noi Thai would have taken Obama within five minutes of Judge Watson"s residence.

User-generated image showing location of Noi Thai, Derrick Watson"s residence and Obama"s purported path from Kailua to Honolulu

The day after Obama"s Tuesday dinner in Honolulu, Derrick Watson issued a ruling which effectively stopped President Donald Trump"s executive order on immigration from taking effect hours later. Observers immediately protested the ruling, noting that not only was Watson appointed to his position by Obama in 2014, they had both graduated from Harvard Law School in 1991.

Judge Watson"s 43-page ruling was issued a mere two hours after hearing arguments on whether or not the immigration ban should be blocked. This would have required Watson to write a page roughly every three minutes, raising questions about whether or not the judge had already made a decision before even hearing arguments from attorneys and had already drafted a ruling. The proximity of the judge to Obama on his vacation just days before the consequential hearing, their lengthy history together and facts indicating that the judge had prepared a ruling before the case even began raise questions about whether or not the former President exercised improper influence in the judge"s decision. Barack Obama"s representatives have yet to issue any comment on the matter.

Research for this article was provided by Kenneth Whittle of Loyola University New Orleans College of Law

In New Executive Order, Trump Plans To Send ISIS Detainees To Guantanamo

The Trump Administration is preparing an executive order that would direct the Pentagon to bring future Islamic State detainees to Guantánamo Bay prison, despite warnings from national security officials and legal scholars that doing so risks undermining what increasinly appears as an "illegal" war launched by Obama to combat the terrorist organization (which many have accused of being directly and indirectly created by Saudi Arabia and the US itself).

According to the NYT which obtained a draft of the order (see below), White House officials "have spelled out their thinking about a new detainee policy in an evolving series of drafts of an executive order being circulated among national security officials for comment.

While previous versions have shown that the draft has undergone many changes – including dropping language about reviving C.I.A. prisons – the plan to add Islamic State detainees to the Guantánamo population has remained constant.  The latest version of the draft, which circulated this week, would direct Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to use Guantánamo to detain suspected members of “Al Qaeda, the Taliban, and associated forces, including individuals and networks associated with the Islamic State.”

The White House has kept similar language in the draft order despite warnings from career government national security officials that carrying out its plan would give federal judges an opportunity to reject the executive branch’s theory that the war against the Islamic State is legal, even though Congress never explicitly authorized it. The issue could arise when reviewing an inevitable habeas corpus lawsuit filed by an ISIS detainee.

The Obama administration first argued in late summer 2014 that the Islamic State was part of the existing armed conflict that Congress authorized in 2001 against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. But while the Islamic State got its start as Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Iraq a decade ago, that theory is disputed because the two groups later split and went to war with each other. By pushing forward with the ISIS detention provision, legal experts challenge that Trump could undo the very basis of the unwritten US war against ISIS:

“It raises huge legal risks,” said Jack Goldsmith, a Harvard Law School professor and former senior Justice Department official in the Bush administration. “If a judge says the Sept. 11 authorization does not cover such a detention, it would not only make that detention unlawful, it would weaken the legal basis for the entire war against the Islamic State.”

Ryan Goodman, a New York University law professor who worked at the Pentagon during the Obama administration, also chimed in and said there were other reasons bringing an Islamic State detainee to Guantánamo for indefinite detention, as opposed to prosecuting him in civilian court, might raise problems: Foreign allies, he said, might refuse to turn over prisoners or assist in detention operations if that was the administration’s goal.

But even if that turns out not to be the case, he said, the legal risks of bringing a suspected member of the Islamic State, sometimes referred to as ISIL, are “very serious.”

“If I were in the administration, I would advise that bringing ISIL fighters to Guantánamo raises too many legal risks,” he said. “If a court finds the 2001 statute does not apply to ISIL because of the extraordinarily remote links between ISIL and the original Al Qaeda, then it would put into legal jeopardy the executive branch’s basis for lethal operations as well as detention operations.”

Ironically, if Goldsmith and Goodman are right, it would be yet another case of Trump getting blamed and punished for errors accumulated during the Obama administration. Here is a brief timeline why, from the NYT:

In the 2012 version of the annual National Defense Authorization Act, Congress bolstered the government’s power to imprison suspected members of Al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated forces by authorizing such detentions without reference to the Sept. 11 attacks. But while it has provided funds for military operations against the Islamic State, it has never explicitly authorized combat or detention operations against it.

In summer 2014, when the group swept out of Syria and began rapidly conquering swaths of Iraq, Mr. Obama launched a bombing campaign to curtail its advances. At the time, he put forth the theory that the group’s early ties to Al Qaeda were sufficient to bring it under the Sept. 11 war authorization without new action from Congress.

Nevertheless, in 2015, the Obama administration asked Congress to enact an authorization for use of military force against the Islamic State. Lawmakers disagreed about whether it should place limits on the use of ground forces or impose an expiration date, and Congress never acted on the proposal. Congress has continued to give no sign that it has the will or the consensus to explicitly authorize war on the Islamic State.

Last year, an army captain sued Mr. Obama, arguing that the war was illegal because Congress had not authorized it. A Federal District Court judge dismissed the lawsuit without ruling on the legal merits, saying the plaintiff lacked standing to bring the case.

Ultimately, the risk is that any Islamic State detainee at Guantánamo would have legal standing to get a court to rule on the question of whether the group is legitimately part of the war against Al Qaeda, thus collapsing Obama"s nearly three year old war against ISIS which was never legally sanctioned.

The full order as released by the NYT is below: