Not Bedwetting Over Khalid Shaikh Mohammed

11:50 am EST November 19th, 2009 | Terrorism | 7 Comments

Spencer Ackerman nails it.

For me, the prospect of KSM grandstanding at his trial falls into I-wish-a-motherfucker-would territory. I want to hear how KSM builds a case against America, because everyone will hear how laughably conspiratorial and clownish it is. Think of what a cathartic moment it will be when America sees the face of the man considered to be UBL’s most efficient henchman and he delivers a pitiful harangue to a bank of cameras. No one will be emboldened to do anything but laugh. The only downside will be his inevitable discussion of how CIA operatives tortured him.

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7 Responses to “Not Bedwetting Over Khalid Shaikh Mohammed”

  1. jr says:
    November 19, 2009 at 1:38 pm

    “you’re not smart enough to protect the city during a trial”-cons to NYPD

  2. KXB says:
    November 19, 2009 at 2:23 pm

    On Campbell Brown last night, one of the guests made a terrific comparison. When the Israelis captured Eichmann and put him on trial in Israel. Both Eichmann and KSM have a hand in atrocities, and when the Israelis put him on trial, in public, Eichmann was shown to be a shriveled old fool. We can expect the same with KSM.

  3. Quaker in a Basement says:
    November 19, 2009 at 4:52 pm

    Court? Due process? That’s OUR turf, baby. If a prosecutor can’t convince a jury that KSM is guilty, he couldn’t convict anyone, ever.

  4. I'm a Hick says:
    November 19, 2009 at 5:11 pm

    It’s been awhile, and I don’t have a link or a clip. But there was a story about a young man who was in the courtroom when Eichman was first brought in. He let out an anguished scream (and may have passed out). Reporters later told him they imagined it must have been a terrible moment for him. He said yes it was, but not for the reasons they thought. He explained that he been expecting to see an Ayrian god and in walked a man who looked just like his father.

  5. PTCruiser says:
    November 19, 2009 at 6:17 pm

    I’m with you. KSM, under our laws and courtroom procedures, has a right to say whatever he damn well pleases if allowed by the judge. I just don’t get folks who are biting their foreheads about what he might say etc. BFD.

  6. Lonya says:
    November 19, 2009 at 9:23 pm

    It was Hannah Arendt in her essay Eichman in Jerusalem who coined the term ‘banality of evil’ to describe Eichman clerk-like appearance. Hopefully one will be able to look back at KSM at trial and see the banality of that evil.

  7. Sanjiv Sarwate says:
    November 20, 2009 at 11:35 am

    Chuck Grassley did us all a favor of saying out loud what conservatives really fear. This whole thing is really fear of O.J. Simpson. In their minds, jury trials are flawed because O.J. went free. They fear some slick Johnnie Cochran type going in, distracting the jury with “irrelevant issues” (like the credibility of the main witnesses), and securing an acquittal for someone who is obviously guilty.

    It’s like that whole idea of letting 1000 guilty people go free to avoid convicting one innocent is turned around, and now it’s better to convict 1000 innocent people just to be sure we don’t accidentally acquit one guilty person.

    And, seriously, does anyone not understand the relationship between the LAPD and the community that made O.J.’s acquittal possible? That same dynamic simply doesn’t exist for KSM.