March 31, 2007, Boomerang justice
And so, we come to the next stage of the "case" against David Hicks, a/k/a "the Australian Taliban", a/k/a "the worst of the worst,"... the man so bad, that thus far, he has been the first and only man charged under the newfangled military commission system passed last year by a Republican-led Congress (with the complicity of a few feckless Democrats who will also eventually have to answer to God for their role in turning our nation back to the year 1214)... Hicks' punishment, after his guilty plea for "material support of terrorism in general"? Nine months, with most of it to be served in Australia.
The Australian source cited seems to indicate that the timing was meant to coincide with the Australian federal elections later this year... wouldn't want to hurt our buddy John Howard, now, would we?
And so it goes: a triumph for our brilliant and perfect Administration, who has, as usual, brilliantly and perfectly picked up and held (indefinitely) the world's worst terrorists... people so bad, that we can sentence them, even after they have pleaded guilty to charges that we say carry a 20 year sentence... to a term of months. First, Hicks was softened up a little by tossing off his trusted counsel, including Josh Dratel. Then he was offered the chance to go back to Australia-- at least before he is dead... And then, out of nowhere, it appears he will be a free man (to the extent possible, of course; his fellow Australian, one-time GTMO resident Mamdouh Habib has not had an easy time of it back home) by the end of the year.
This, boys and girls, is the absolute worst of the worst of the worst, at least in terms of the prosecution choices made by our government. If enough people start to put all this together, this could be the beginning of the end of our excellent GTMO adventure... Of course, with the Bushmen in charge of anything, that is not-- not at all-- how you bet.