Saddam is dead -- so what's next?

The video of Saddam's execution is raging across the internets. I'm not going to watch it, nor will I link to this barbaric display of pointless revenge. To the extent that it brings some sense of closure to the families of Hussien's victims, I hope at least that much good comes of his hanging because I'm afraid when we snapped the tyrant's neck we also choked the last breath from our own morality.

I really don't want to talk about it anymore so I'll send you to Jane Hamsher who beautifully articulates my disgust at this spectacle and Glenn Greenwald who more eloquently expresses my amazement at the notion that justice was somehow served. Fair trial? Feh. But as Glenn points out, even in that foreign kangaroo court, Saddam received more in the way of due process than our own citizens have under the unilateral rule of Bush. Further, for those who may still question whether our government had their own reasons to push for this execution, Chris Floyd fleshes out our complicity in Saddam's atrocities.

So now that Saddam is dead, what's next? Will peace suddenly break out in Baghdad? Will the violence in Anbar be quelled? Apparently not.

There was no sign of a feared Sunni uprising in retaliation for the execution, and the bloodshed from civil warfare on Saturday was not far off the daily average - 92 from bombings and death squads. ...The U.S. military announced six more service members were killed - three soldiers and three Marines.

What does that say about the occupation when consistent death tolls of 100 people a day merit no more than a routine mention buried in obligatory news of the day from the front lines of "teh war."

Meanwhile, some US military bases were reported to be celebrating but members of the Army's 2nd Battalion, 17th Field Artillery Regiment, on patrol in an overwhelmingly Shiite neighborhood in eastern Baghdad, took a more pragmatic view.

"Nothing really changes," said Capt. Dave Eastburn, 30. "The militias run everything now, not Saddam."

Nothing really changes. Doesn't that really just sum it up?