On Tuesday, the Obama administration is scheduled to begin its first trial of a prisoner held at Guantanamo Bay. Omar Khadr was only 15 when he was captured in a firefight in 2002 with U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Now 23, he’ll finally have his day in court. Only instead of an experienced federal court with a long history of trying terror suspects, Khadr will be tried in a military commission, created just last year. In the eight years since President George W. Bush created the first military commissions at Guantanamo, they have convicted only four terrorists – only two in contested trials. Regular federal courts in the United States, by contrast, have convicted more than 400 in the same time period.

At long last, Rep. David Obey has called the question: which is more important to America – saving teachers’ jobs, or pointless killing in Afghanistan? This could be the beginning of the end of the Washington consensus that wars and other military spending exist on their own fiscal planet. But where are the big Democratic constituency groups? It isn’t just a question of missing an opportunity: there is a freight train coming called “deficit reduction,” and if cuts in military spending aren’t on board the train, the train’s cargo will be cuts in Social Security and Medicare benefits.