President Barack Obama delivered his inaugural address for his second term. Part of the speech highlighted war. He suggested, quite absurdly, a “decade of war is now ending” and later described how Americans believe there is no need for “perpetual war.”

A “rule book” for drones that the administration of President Barack Obama has been developing is reportedly near completion, according to the Washington Post. Unnamed US officials told the newspaper the CIA is set to benefit from a “major exemption” that would allow them to continue conducting CIA drone operations without having to follow the rules. But the Obama administration is fine with this exemption because John Brennan, a national counterterrorism adviser, is set to take the position of CIA chief.

Eleven years ago, the United States began to imprison detainees in the Guantanamo Bay prison camps. One hundred and sixty-six prisoners remain imprisoned. One hundred and fifty-seven have not been charged with any crime. Eighty-six of the prisoners have been cleared for release. Yet, all three branches of the United States government, the vast majority of the US media, and most Americans do not seem to find the ongoing injustice at Guantanamo to be all that significant or troubling.

Members of militant groups in Pakistan may not be able to do much to prevent the United States from launching drone strikes in Pakistan, but, as the New York Times‘ Declan Walsh reports, militants conduct witch hunts against people they suspect of being informers and often torture them before shooting, hanging or beheading them.

Not a lot of Democrats disagree with this policy — certainly not the President who approves of it — and obviously no Republican ever met a bomb they didn’t approve of (it’s the people they can’t stand)

On Christmas Eve, a US drone attacked a vehicle and killed at least two suspected al Qaeda militants in the southern Bayda province of Yemen. The attack happened in the early evening in the country. It was believed a “mid-level al Qaeda Yemeni operative,” Abdel-Raouf Naseeb, was one of the men killed. It was the first strike in Yemen in 47 days, according to The Bureau of Investigative Journalism.

U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) reported that the body of Allal Ab-Aljallil Abd al-Rahman Abd (aka Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif) was repatriated to Yemen. The SOUTHCOM statement did not indicate the date or time the body was returned, nor who received the remains.

The major newspaper endorsements indicate the makeover American superpower received when President Barack Obama was elected in 2008 worked. There is unanimous consensus among the top twenty newspapers that endorsed Obama that Obama repaired the image of America that was damaged by two terms of President George W. Bush.

The Washington Post has published a third story in its series on the Obama administration’s institutionalization of its targeted killing program. This story highlights Camp Lemmonier, the United States military base in Djibouti where drones land or take off around sixteen times a day, and is reportedly the first time the US military has confirmed publicly drones are present at this base.

One hour and a half was the time the two campaigns agreed upon for the foreign policy debate. They had a moderator, Bob Schieffer, who would ask all questions from the point of view that America is justified in whatever it does so long as it does it. When and how to do it would be the discussion, not why or whether it was legal, moral or humane.