They're selling postcards of the hanging

By Capt. Fogg

Cell phone video is providing us with many things the media find too repulsive or dangerous to put on public view, so it is not surprising that the Execution of Saddam in all it's horror can be seen on the web.

The actual drop, the grotesquely broken neck, and the swinging body, heart no doubt still fluttering, are accompanied by stills of the purpling corpse in a blood stained shroud, but what is perhaps more disturbing is the audio -- at least to those who speak Arabic. According to Bob Murphy, Senior Vice President of ABC News, the official recording did not have the hostile taunts revealed on the "pirate" video: "It's clearly a hostile environment."

Will the Passion of Saddam going to his ignominious death while being taunted by his enemies play well in Sunni Iraq and elsewhere? Will The Shroud of Baghdad become a sacred object? Stranger things have happened and I expect that the civil war -- or "sectarian violence," if you prefer -- will not be lessened in intensity by the killing of Saddam, nor will it change attidudes toward the U.S. for the better.

(Cross-posted at Human Voices.)