At the opening of the Saddam trial... Dictators Dictate

… and too many of us listen:

Afterwards, as he was being led out of court, Saddam angrily ordered two jailers in armored vests not to hold his arms. He squabbled with them for a minute and shoved one of them hard in the shoulder, and then they let him walk out untouched.

As for why the trial was postponed today:

The judge, Rizgar Mohammed Amin, who is Kurdish, told Reuters the main reason for the adjournment was that between 30 and 40 witnesses, some of them relatives of the men killed, had been too frightened to show up and testify.

Is that the real or whole reason? I don’t know. But the possibility of it gives me the shivers.