A single holdout kept the jury from handing a death sentence to Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person ...

Given all the problems they had trying to get the lone hold out to express their reason for the vote, you would think that it would be required to do secret ballots or someone would suggest that they do an open vote.

You had a deeply repulsive figure, plus a government that was, lets be honest here, willing to go to extraordinary lengths for the sole purpose of exectuting someone (rather than simply locking them up and throwing away the key) - and through this all we gave the world an example of how a fair system can end up rendering a verdict that the government didn't want.

Even the monster himself, at the end of it all, concluded "hey, I guess its true that even I can get a fair trial in America - can I maybe take that guilty plea back"?

I think that if we look at the entire process, and see all the steps we take to ensure fairness, we can be very proud of it all - whether we agree with the verdict or not. I think we should publicize things like this, not hide them by carrying out some different process in a military tribunal behind closed doors.

For in the end, what did the monster accomplish that we should take steps to insure doesnt happen again? He made a complete fool of himself.

Doctor Krauthammer is also noted as having said on Fox the day of the verdict, that he really didn't have a dog in the hunt either way, on this particular death penalty case.

His point about the process not belonging in a civilian court is valid, however, an in my opinion the biggest issue the Moussaoui case deals with. That went EXACTLY the wrong way.

The way our justice system is set up is that we demand unanimous consent to sentence someone to death. That a single juror can affect that determination by voting against the death penalty isn't troubling. The troubling part is how the lone juror man....