Show Trial of the Century!

The question isn't how will it end, but when will the trigger be pulled?

Published on December 6, 2005 By singrdave In Current Events

So the trial of Saddam Hussein has begun. The question isn't how will it end, but when will the trigger be pulled?

Does anyone think he's getting a trial that isn't already decided? Does anyone think Saddam will walk? I'm on the edge of my seat!

From the Washington Post:
The trial of Saddam Hussein is just beginning, and already it has become an utterly compelling made-for-TV spectacle. The Iraqis, in this case, have proved to be precocious students; clearly they understand all the conventions we established over the years in our many television-era Trials of the Century -- Patricia Hearst, Rodney King's cops, Michael Jackson and, of course, the O.J. Simpson trial, our masterpiece, our Mona Lisa of jurisprudence run amok.

Iraq is being taught that everyone gets a fair trial. Or at least a trial. Or at least a trial whose outcome is already in the can.

And Ramsey Clark... what's with this guy?

The first necessity is sufficient worldwide interest to attract a media horde, and Hussein's trial certainly qualifies on this score. You also need a celebrity defense lawyer, an F. Lee Bailey or a Johnnie Cochran, and for a while it looked as if the Hussein trial was lacking on this score. But then Ramsey Clark, the former U.S. attorney general, parachuted in to give the defense table some international star power.

So a man who was once the highest-ranking legal official in the United States is defending a dictator whom the United States waged a major war to depose. And it turns out that Clark isn't there just to observe or provide window dressing. He's there to perform. On Monday he insisted on addressing the court, ignored the judge's instruction to keep to one narrow topic, and then led a brief walkout of the whole defense team -- all this without being able to speak a word of Arabic.

Does he really think he's helping? Or is he just grandstanding and showboating in the courtroom? Or both? Maybe he thinks his antics can bring legitimacy to the trial.

Iraqis do need to be taught that Iraq is a nation of laws. They need to learn that anyone, even their former leader, can be tried for their crimes. They also need to know that crime and punishment is based on a set of laws, not the whims of their dictator.

Are these the lessons being taught by the Show Trial of the Century?

Comments

Dr Guy

on Dec 06, 2005

Kind of early for a Trial of the Century. But no, this is not the case to show how jurisprudence is supposed to work. Ramsey clark is a farce by himself. I would not put it past the judges to lock him up. Maybe in Abu Ghraib? That would be delicious irony.

He brings nothing to the defense, and as has been shown, only knows how to mug for the camera.

ParaTed2k

on Dec 06, 2005

I've wondered from the beginning how fair a trial can be when there isn't a person in the room with any reason to tell the truth, and the defendant has no reason to participate in his own defense.

If I were Hussein, I'd just sit on the stand and say whatever I felt would cause the most international problems.. mixing the lies and the truth well enough that nobody stops to figure out which is which. ;~D

singrdave

on Dec 06, 2005

Kind of early for a Trial of the Century.

How about the Trial of the First Tenth of the Century?

If I were Hussein, I'd just sit on the stand and say whatever I felt would cause the most international problems.. mixing the lies and the truth well enough that nobody stops to figure out which is which.

And he is doing just that. All his cries of an unjust trial, paraded about by a puppet government... all trying to lend credibility to his defense. He cries that he's not guilty; the Americans are.

Ramsey clark is a farce by himself.

His in-court antics are laughable and moronic. Does he think his grandstanding and bloviating about the fledgling Iraqi Justice system will help his client? Or does it just help himself?

Dr Guy

on Dec 06, 2005

Or does it just help himself?

I think that says it all.

singrdave

on Dec 07, 2005

But what on earth could Ramsey Clark get out of all of this? His name in the papers once again?

No, I don't have an answer. Not a rhetorical question. I really want to know, what does Ramsey Clark see this'll do for himself?
'Cause there's no way he's doing this for Saddam.

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