Here we are in this heavily-armed, no-frills courtroom at Guantanamo Bay, feeling rather victorious after successfully convicting the first of the worst of the worst. Which worst is first? Hicks was first—the worst of the first—not exactly the roughly-shorn, thick-bearded, Koran-carrying terrorist we’ve been holding our breath to see tried over these past four years, but close enough for the books. He’s from Australia, after all, which is somewhere near China, and he did plead guilty, and that’s somethin’, ain’t it?

Guilty to what? “Training with Al Queda, guarding a Taliban tank and scouting a closed American embassy building,” as per the NY Times. While, as the Times continues, “there is no evidence he was considering a terrorist attack or capable of carrying one out,” that’s no excuse for a brothers-in-arms wannabe who dropped out of school in 9th grade and “ran away” when the bombs started dropping in Afghanistan.

With the heart of a true killer, Hicks, after five years and four months at Guantanamo, pleaded guilty to the above charges and also signed a statement recanting his accusations of being mistreated during detention and also promised not to talk to reporters for a year. Indeed, his lawyer, Major Michael Mori of the Marines, told the court that Hicks wished to apologize to Australia and the United States for his behavior, as Hicks himself was far too mousy and terrified to speak himself.

Lead prosecutor Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Chenail told the court, Senator McCarthy-style: “Today in the courtroom, we’re on the front lines of the global war on terror. The enemy is sitting at the defense table.” He then shot a lightening bolt at Hicks, who promptly wet his pants and responded, somewhat off cue, that he had “never been abused while in detention by the United States at Guantanamo Bay or anywhere else.”

“Silence!” spake the judge. “Let’s have a ruling!”

For his heinous, carefully-calculated and ultimately devastating allegiance with Al Qaeda, Hicks was given nine months, roughly the time for dealing heavily in marijuana, yet another reason pot should be outlawed.

The lesson here is: Stay in school. Read your history books and score high on your standardized tests, and you will very likely never suffer the fate of David Hicks. As for him, despite his oath-of-silence with the press, he will nonetheless go down in history as the first bird to fly over this particular cuckoo’s nest.