It's fucking incredible how long you can spend on the internet without actually doing anything. I've been on the net for, oh 2 or 3 hours, and I can't even remember what the hell I've been looking at. God be with the days when we all sat around the fire tellin' shtories.

Below is some sarcastic drivel (ie. satire) I wrote on the occasion of Saddam Hussein's trial. Note to lawyers: the text below is pure fiction. All quotes and events included therein are wholly fabricated and bear no relation to real events. Honest. Anyway, I have no money. You'd be suing an impecunious student. And Seán Kenny isn't my real name.

Saddam Lawyer Slams Court’s Failure to Allow Client Fade into Obscurity

Lawyers for Saddam Hussein are preparing to argue that their client’s fundamental human right to avoid prosecution and fade into obscurity outside Iraq has been denied. They will argue that legal precedence dictates that this right, granted to past despots such as Uganda's Idi Amin and Haiti's 'Baby Doc' Duvalier, also applies to their client and has been cruelly ignored by the court established to try Saddam.

According to Saddam’s lead counsel, Khalil-al-Dulaimi, “there is a long and noble tradition of allowing deposed rulers of dubious democratic legitimacy slip quietly into a life of luxurious exile. My client’s favoured destination would be an Arab brother-state, preferably one with ample beaches where alcohol is easily attainable. Tunisia, for example, would be ideal.”

Dulaimi believes that the regime Saddam has been subjected to while incarcerated in Iraq is also a breach of his client’s basic rights as a former dictator. “As an absolute ruler of over twenty years’ standing, my client naturally has highly sophisticated culinary tastes. In a callous and calculating move, the Americans have attempted to break his spirit by serving him low-to-average quality food and drink.”

Dulaimi related how, on one shocking occasion, the ex-dictator had even been served own-brand tea from a discount Baghdad supermarket. “This to a man accustomed to only the finest Earl Grey; is this not cruel and unusual?” said Dulaini as a bullet zipped past his left ear.

Moreover, Saddam intends to take legal action against George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld on the grounds that his quality of life has disimproved considerably since the U.S. launched hostilities against Iraq in March ’03. “My client has endured terrible hardship and trauma. Before his imprisonment he had to live an itinerant existence without a regular supply of water, electricity or prostitutes. He has, in fact, had to endure the living conditions faced by ordinary Iraqis.” Mr Dulaini’s press conference was then interrupted as a series of rockets exploded in his immediate vicinity.

Meanwhile, a star-studded array of concerned dictators from around the globe recently came together at a glittering ceremony in downtown Harare to show their solidarity with Saddam in his hour of need. Speaking at the ceremony, President of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe, announced the formation of a dictators’ rights group, A.I.D. (The Association for Incarcerated Dictators). The charity will campaign for the humane treatment of imprisoned ex-rulers.

Flanked by Cuba’s Fidel Castro and Kim Jong Il of North Korea on the podium, Mr Mugabe made an impassioned plea for clemency in Saddam’s case. “Dictatorship is a high-risk career. Dictators trying to do an honest day’s work face innumerable occupational hazards: coups d’etat, invasion, discovery of the mutilated corpses of your political opponents by human rights groups. And to finally face imprisonment and trial for merely performing your patriotic duty like our esteemed colleague Saddam…How do we expect to attract young people to take up a career in dictatorship under such conditions?”

A.I.D. will plead with the authorities that, at the very least, Saddam should be allowed to sport the traditional dictator’s garb of olive green fatigues, sunglasses and beret instead of a prison uniform.