In The News

Saddam Hussein is dead. It was perhaps all he deserved. But this is as bad as or worse than the victor's justice of Nuremberg.

By killing Hussein, the new Iraqi government has managed to do what Hussein himself never truly could: turned him into a religious martyr.

Benefits of killing Saddam: a few people felt better about not ever getting back the loved ones who were tortured, murdered, gassed, or simply disappeared under his hand.

Bad effects of killing him:
1) It pissed off Iraqi Sunni muslims.
Today there was mourning in Tikrit, as Sunni Hussein loyalists celebrated his elevation to martyrdom.

2) It pissed off non-Sunnis.
Did someone forget to tell the government that it's a bad idea to go through with a religiously-charged execution during a holy festival?

And yet the government seems to have understood this idea sufficiently well to postpone the execution of his co-condemned until at least next Thursday.

3) It sent a garbled message.
A government that has been calling for reconciliation and co-operation, to the extent of mulling over re-installing Ba'athist army officers and officials, sent a message that there is no forgiveness. So what's the motivation to co-operate and reconcile?

Saddam was more valuable in jail. But Iraq is still a backward place. And the nation that either liberated the Iraqis or plunged them into civil war, depending on your point of view, is itself so backward that it still has the death penalty in the midst of it's "Culture of Life".

The toast I give (if and when I need an excuse to lift a beer to my lips) is "Death to all tyrants." But I could have waited a few dozen years for this one.