Law West of the Tigris

So they hung Saddam Hussein.

While it would have been salutary for all concerned for Hussein to spend the rest of his days in prison in The Hague (along with Henry Kissinger, George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, Pol Pot, Pinochet & a goodly number of others), there is no human punishment adequate to the scale of his (or their) crimes. Of far more importance than the punishment is the establishment of the truth of their crimes and the degree of their culpability. It is after that point that discussion of punishment, clemency & amnesty can begin.

The best construction that can be placed on the Iraqi Court is that rather than representing Law, it is a blunt attempt to establish Order, a la Judge Roy Bean of Trans-Pecos Texas, by means of judicial murder.,,only it is if Bean were a puppet of say, the Mexican Government...