I cannot help but laugh at the trial of a Yemeni man who was Osama bin Laden's driver from 1996 - 2001 when he was captured without protest and would not fire the gun he had in his possession at his arresting officers. He freely gave all the information he had which amounted to, more or less, the houses or locations he drove bin Laden to. He even gave the authorities the locations of what are known as safe houses for Al Quaeda members.

This man would have driven anyone who would pay him the $200.00 a month he was receiving for his work. There is nothing that would link him to the Taliban or Al Quaeda and he swore no allegiance to bin Laden. America, is this the best you can do after all these years? To prosecute this uneducated man for changing tires, oil changes and generally being certain all the lug nuts were tight? If they wish to make him guilty by association then someone is going to have to explain why they didn't pursue a case against Adolph Hitler's driver after WW II.

From the Yahoo article:

Even if they find him innocent, Hamdan may not be released. The military retains the right to hold "enemy combatants" considered a threat to the United States — even those cleared of charges by the tribunals.

So yes, if the outcome doesn't matter, this trial is a joke.

The Pentagon wants to prosecute anybody that can be viewed as having the slightest connection to terrorism. This makes it seem to the American people, and to the rest of the world, like the United States government is doing more than its part in preventing terrorism. Just think about 9/11/091 - within hours, the government came out with a list of 19 probable suspects in the hijackings, and most immediately called Suddam Hussein the mastermind behind it all. However, Hussein was actually on our side in the fight against terrorists, and at least six of the nineteen accused hijackers have been proved to be alive and have no connection to the attacks.

This is a similar situation, albeit on a much smaller scale. The United States has not found Bin Laden, so they are trying to connect Hamdan to the attacks so that they can at least supply a consolation prize. Anybody that has done anything that directly or indirectly aided Bin Laden risks being in the same position as Hamdan.

The verdict is in...Hamden guilty of "supporting terrorism"

From Yahoo News: "Army Lt. Col. Stephen Abraham, a former Guantanamo official who has since become critical of the legal process, mocked the decision to prosecute a driver as the tribunal's first defendant."

"We can only trust that the next subjects ... will include cooks, tailors, and cobblers without whose support terrorist leaders would be left unfed, unclothed, and unshod, and therefore rendered incapable of planning or executing their attacks," Abraham said in an e-mail to The Associated Press.

*Follow-up: He has now been sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison of which he has already served 5 years and 1 month! Tell me that they couldn't have sentenced him to time already served. This truly is a JOKE!!! Amen.

Who will the lame duck Bushies beat the bushes for next to haul before an august military tribunal at Camp Gitmo? Bin Laden's cook, maid or bottle washer? Bin Laden's driver as a terrorist mastermind? I'm afraid he has nothing on New York cabbies. It all amounts to a hill of...well, camel dung.

This is "a trial that will be closely watched as the first full test of the Pentagon's system for prosecuting alleged terrorists." The same people that did not want to give trials to Gitmo prisoners are the same people that want to convict Hamdan. They have high political incentive to prove that the Gitmo prisoners deserve to be prisoners, and that they don't deserve the trials.