The Iraqi government seems to be in a big hurry to get Saddam hanged. I keep wondering why. Do they really think his death would in any way quell the sectarian violence? Surely not. Saddam has been pretty much irrelevant to events in Iraq since he crawled into that spider hole after the invasion.

I guess I'm just a cynical Bush hater, but I can't help but notice that his execution will be timed perfectly for dubya to use as a centerpiece in the State of the Union address. Is it just me or does every event that this administration has a hand in feel somehow managed? He'll get to call the execution "progress" and use it to further justify his escalation of the war. Come on, we all know that's what he's going to do, just like we all knew he was going into Iraq a year before he actually did it. And I bet we all get to see that scary little flash of insanity in his eyes when he says the word "evildoers."

I also can't help noticing that they tried Saddam, found him guilty and sentenced him to death for something he did in 1982. Why aren't they going to try him for any of his other crimes? He committed some atrocities during the Iran-Iraq War using chemical weapons. Given that our reason for the invasion was WMDs, you would think that the US would be pushing for very public trials for these crimes, but they aren't. Why? Could it have something to do with the fact that a large part of dubya's crew were with the Reagan administration when St. Ronnie was supplying arms to both sides during that war? These people are just too damn good at keeping secrets.