prisoners-tortured-at-gitmojpeg.jpgThe WSJ editorial page thinks everyone’s being unfair about the fine job the Bush administration did with the Hamdan case

On Thursday, a war crimes tribunal sentenced Salim Hamdan to a mere five and a half years in prison, which, with credit for time served, means that Osama bin Laden’s bodyguard and driver could be released as early as January. To borrow the obligatory media idiom, this "raises questions" about the process — namely one: Could anything happen at Guantanamo that isn’t "a stunning rebuke" or "an embarrassing blow" to the Bush Administration?

That’s the front page of the WSJ they’re annoyed at there.

A military commission delivered an embarrassing blow to the Bush administration’s first war-crimes prosecution, sentencing Osama bin Laden’s former driver to just five additional months’ imprisonment instead of the 30 years to life the government wanted.

The surprisingly light sentence could be a bad omen for the government, which is preparing the more dramatic trials of the key alleged Sept. 11 conspirators. Prosecution officials had considered the evidence against Salim Hamdan to represent one of their strongest cases.

Joseph McMillan, one of Mr. Hamdan’s civilian attorneys, said the Bush administration wanted to railroad defendants, but the "honor and integrity" of the military jurors produced a fair sentence.

Prosecutor John Murphy told the court that Mr. Hamdan was "a hardened al Qaeda member" who should "not get one day less than 30 years," a penalty "so significant that it forecloses any possibility that he renews his ties with terrorism."

The jury of six military officers, which on Wednesday convicted Mr. Hamdan of providing material support for a terrorist organization, instead handed down a sentence of 66 months, with credit for the 61 he has already served.

Um, yeah. That is kind of an embarrassing blow. Only not, says the editorial page, because it proves The System Works

The sentence came down a day after Hamdan was absolved of the more serious of the two charges leveled against him. The prior political narrative was that the commissions amounted to a new Inquisition. But never mind. Some eminences claimed that Hamdan’s partial acquittal really meant he had been found "guilty as ordered." Now a panel of senior military officers has rejected the 30-year sentence prosecutors requested — and we are told that also counts as a strike against military commissions…

If anything, Hamdan’s sentence again validates the fairness and due-process safeguards embedded in the system.

The front page tactlessly points out that the System had to be dragged kicking and screaming into giving Hamdan the safeguards he did have

Mr. Hamdan is already synonymous with challenges to the administration’s detention program. It was his case that led the Supreme Court in 2006 to strike down the administration’s first iteration of the military commission system, which the White House justified as necessary to ensure convictions of dangerous foreign terrorists. The system now in place gives defendants some rights the president initially sought to deny, such as attending all sessions of their trials, but the government has maintained that defendants have no constitutional rights.

but here the editorial page tops itself — the Hamdan situation proves the system works because he _may_ be released at the end of his prison term for political reasons

Hamdan could be held indefinitely as an enemy combatant, but the political explosion that option would touch off makes it all but untenable. In five months, he is likely to be repatriated to Yemen.

even though the System believes that he has no right to be released at the end of his prison term if they want to hold on to him – he may have received a definite sentence from the jury, but the jury doesn’t matter (this from the Times of London, another of those liberal Murdoch rags)

The US military tribunal that tried Osama bin Laden’s driver ruled that he should be freed by the end of the year. The Pentagon has suggested that he may be in jail indefinitely. The final decision, according to the judge in the case of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, could be in the hands of Allah.

Hamdan was sentenced by a jury of six military officers to 66 months in prison on Thursday for supporting terrorism — but was acquitted of being part of al-Qaeda’s conspiracy to attack the United States. To the outrage of human rights groups, the Pentagon insists that it can continue to hold “enemy combatants” beyond the end of their sentence — a position it is under growing pressure to abandon.

IOW, Hamdan’s "guilty as ordered," and he’s only going to be given freedom when his term is served if the president and the DOD cave to political pressure.

The judge, at least, doesn’t seem to think that either one is Hamdan’s best bet

The need for divine intervention was raised in a telling moment at the climax of Hamdan’s trial — the first of a War on Terror suspect held at the Guantanamo Bay detention centre. With credit for 61 months and eight days of time already served, the Yemeni will be eligible for release just before New Year’s Eve.

“I wish you God speed, Mr Hamdan,” the judge, Navy Captain Keith Allred, told him. “I hope the day comes that you return to your wife and daughters and your country, and you’re able to be a provider, a father and a husband in the best sense of all those terms.”

The detainee replied: “Inshallah” — God willing.

“Inshallah,” the US military judge agreed.