We Almost Agree With Ramsey Clark On One Point

When news reporters are dismissive or derogatory about a left-winger, you know they must really be out there. Especially when it deals with the United States and Iraq.

The news, when it found its way back to the United States, caused something of a stir. A few news reports were inquisitive — and some were skeptical — but most were simply dismissive or derogatory. "There goes Ramsey Clark again," they seemed to say. "Isn't it a shame? He used to be attorney general of the United States and now look at what he's doing."

We can’t say we have ever found ourselves in agreement with Ramsey Clark on anything before, but in this one part of his Iraqi Dictator Has Been Demonized column, he nearly nails our opinion.


However, we would have said: Isn’t it disgusting? He used to be attorney general of the United States and now look at what he's doing - defending evil incarnate and comparing the leaders of the United States to the Butcher of Baghdad.


Think we are being a bit hash, see the excepts below or the entire column here.

The United States, and the Bush administration in particular, engineered the demonization of Saddam, and it has a clear political interest in his conviction. Obviously, a fair trial of Saddam will be difficult to ensure — and critically important to the future of democracy in Iraq. This trial will write history, affect the course of violence around the world and have an impact on hopes for reconciliation within Iraq.

Saddam has been held illegally for more than a year without once meeting a family member, friend or lawyer of his choice. Although the world has seen him time and again on television — disheveled, apparently disoriented with someone prying deep into his mouth and later alone before some unseen judge — he has been cut off from all communications with the outside world and surrounded by the same U.S. military that mistreated prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay.

The United States has destroyed any hope of legitimacy, fairness or even decency by its treatment of the former president and its creation of the Iraqi Special Tribunal to try him.

Finally, any court that considers criminal charges against Saddam Hussein must have the power and the mandate to consider charges against leaders and military personnel of the United States, Britain and the other nations that participated in the aggression against Iraq, if equal justice under law is to have meaning.