Justice, finally.

Judge Richard Leon of the D.D.C just ordered the United States government to free five Algerian men that have been held at Guantanamo Bay for almost seven years. This is welcome and long overdue news.

Obviously, I am not familiar with the facts in these cases, but they must be fairly weak to have caused federal judge to order the outright release of five 'terrorists'. Gtmo is a catastrophe on many levels - - degradation of rule of law values, blatant ignorance of humanitarian law, loss of American exceptionalism - - but, on a purely visceral level, the most troubling aspect of this enterprise is that the vast majority of detainees were not as Donald Rumsfeld claimed, the "worst of the worst." In fact, most of the persons detained at Guantanamo were hapless bystanders that had the misfortune to be at the wrong place at the wrong time - 90 percent by one count. For example, shortly after the war in Afghanistan began, the US dropped leaflets offering substantial financial rewards for the capture of Taliban and Al Qadea operatives. Not surprisingly in a society consisting of rival tribal groups, members of one group turned in their enemies to the Americans when the opportunity presented itself. I know this, among other reasons, because I helped represent a man to whom this happened, a man who spent almost five years in Gtmo for no discernible reasons, a man who is now free and living with his family.

Anyway, I'm glad to see the system - the real system and not the one G.W. and his cronies invented - working. This is a good day for America.