Hanging for Saddam

NY Times:

An Iraqi special tribunal today convicted Saddam Hussein of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to death by hanging for the brutal repression of a Shiite town in the 1980s.

As the verdict was read, Mr. Hussein shouted, "Long live the people! Long live the Arab nation! Down with the spies!" He then chanted "God is great." The chief judge, Raouf Rasheed Abdul Rahman, tried to calm Mr. Hussein down. "There’s no point," Mr. Rahman said.

The five-judge panel, which heard more than nine months of testimony in the case, also issued death sentences for two of his seven co-defendants: Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, Mr. Hussein’s half-brother, who was head of Iraq’s domestic intelligence agency; and Awad al-Bandar, president of Mr. Hussein’s revolutionary court.

For many Iraqis, the verdicts represented a moment of triumph and catharsis after decades of suffering under Mr. Hussein’s tyrannical rule.

Spontaneous celebrations broke out across Iraq in spite of an around-the-clock curfew imposed on the capital and other regions. Pistols and assault rifles were fired into the air across the capital and elsewhere in a common gesture of celebration. People flooded the streets of Sadr City, a Shiite bastion of Baghdad, whooping and dancing and sounding car horns. Even some Shiite police officers joined in the celebratory gunfire.

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Justice is coming to the tyrant that the Democrats wish was still in power in Iraq. While there was some scattered violence in some Sunni neighborhoods it seemed to be outweighed by the celebrations elsewhere. Democrats should be asked if they still want him in power.