Am I the only one troubled by this?

Federal District Judge John Coughenour in Los Angeles yesterday sentenced a would-be bomber to a twenty-two year sentence. The man could be free in fourteen years. After this, the Judge Coughenour proceeded to use the courtroom venue not as a place to consider the law, but to weigh in on security, military, and partisan political issues.

While sentencing the convicted bomber, Coughenour read (in his prepared statement): "We did not need to use a secret military tribunal, detain the defendant indefinitely as an enemy combatant or deny the defendant the right to counsel... The message to the world from today's sentencing is that our courts have not abandoned our commitment to the ideals that set our nation apart."

The bomber was an Algerian national named Ahmed Ressam. He was trained in Afghanistan. He was a terrorist making war against our country in a conflict nobody wanted to acknowledge existed prior to 9/11.

Several points, therefore:

1. By handing down a sentence that allowed this guy an opportunity to do anything besides immediately meet his seventy virgins, Judge Coughenour established that perhaps the case would have been handled better by a military tribunal.

2. By offering political commentary from the bench, Judge Coughenour punctures any illusion of judicial objectivity. Federal prosecutors should object strenuously to having him handle any cases touching upon terrorism or national security in the future.

3. The Ressam case is different from that of the Gitmo vacationers. First, he was apprehended before 9/11. Second, he was captured in the United States, not in a foreign war zone.

4. The prosecutors wanted thirty-five years. That might have been the most they could ask for, considering the guy didn't succeed in killing anyone, bit it was still too easy. Terrorist activities should be a capital offense.

5. Prosecutors say that they tried to make a deal with Ressam so they could get information to extradite two other captured terrorists. Ressam quit cooperating and now prosecutors say they will have to drop extradition. Why didn't the judge hit Ressam with the maximum 35 years for that alone?

6. The message Judge Coughenour sends to the world is not: "...Our courts have not abandoned our commitment to the ideals that set our nation apart." Rather, the message he sends is: "Our courts oppose prudent national security measures and also are easy on convicted terrorists. Come make war on our nation!"