Senator Rand Paul’s epic filibuster was technically intended to delay a vote on John Brennan’s nomination to head the CIA.  It’s real purpose, though, was to force Attorney General Eric Holder to answer a straightforward question:  “Does the President have the authority to use a weaponized drone to kill an American not engaged in combat on American soil?”  On March 7, it looked as if Rand Paul won that battle when Eric Holder said “no,” the President does not have that authority.  A closer look at the more detailed memos that Eric Holder has written, however, shows that Eric Holder has managed to carve out virtually unlimited rights for the President’s use of drones on American soil.

Paul began his filibuster because, when he first asked Eric Holder about the drone program on American soil, Eric Holder had written that the President could order a drone strike on American citizens in America, if there was a 9/11 situation.  Holder confined his answer to the President’s power in the event of actual combat on American soil.  He refused, though, to respond to Paul’s follow-up question about a non-combat scenario.

It was this refusal that triggered Rand Paul’s filibuster.  As far as Rand Paul was concerned, it’s a pretty straightforward question:  Can a president rain Hellfire down on an American citizen — even an American citizen planning illegal activity — if the citizen is, at that moment, quietly going about his business in a non-combat situation?

During his almost 13-hour long filibuster, Paul came up with some liberty-oriented statements that should forever enter the conservative playbook:

“They shouldn’t just drop a Hellfire missile on your cafe experience.”

“If you give up your rights now, don’t expect to get them back.”

[A hypothetical question to President Obama:]  “So you can murder anyone you want, anywhere, any time?”

Paul not only managed to derail the scheduled vote for John Brennan, he finally forced Eric Holder to answer his question.  The next day, Eric Holder issued what is probably the world’s shortest letter ever written by a lawyer:

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