America's Chateau d'If

By Baxter

So the Bush Administration, after years of bellowing that he was a dangerous terrorist, has finally negotiated Salim Ahmed Hamdan's handover to his native country, Yemen.

Hamdan is a guy who falls into our "poor slob" category — a hapless jerk who was picked up after September 11, 2001, on a flimsy pretense. And whose case would have efficiently sorted out — if American justice had been left to its own, very sensible devices.

But, no. The Bush Administration had other ideas — so Mr. Hamdan is the 21st-century version of Jean Valjean. (Or Edmond Dantes, depending on which literary classic appeals to you.)

It occurs to us cats that Mr. Hamdan — who was convicted on far lesser charges than George W. Bush (or Dick Cheney) would have preferred — has spent more time in unwarranted United States custody than John McCain did, as a captive of the Viet Cong, in Viet Nam. Does this mean that Mr. Hamdan has a brilliant political career ahead of him, simply because he suffered an unjust captivity? Not to draw comparisons. Just sayin'.

We cats SNARL at the fact that the U.S. justice system could ever be put in this sorry-ass position: lumped in the same category as the tyrannies of the world. It'll take a long time before America can extricate itself from the days it turned its back on the Geneva Conventions. In the meantime, we hope that Senator Obama's Administration will be able to sort through these horrors and put them right.