Step 1: Arrest Colonel Denise Lind

Step 2: Charge her with violations of Article 92 (Failure to Obey an Order or Regulation), Article 98 (Non-Compliance with Procedural Rules) and Article 134 (the "General Article," specifically "conduct of a nature to bring discredit upon the armed forces") of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Step 3: Give her the speedy trial she continues to allow the military to deny Bradley Manning, then let her spend some quality time making big rocks into smaller rocks.

Article 98 is the most relevant one:

Any person subject to this chapter who --

(1) is responsible for unnecessary delay in the disposition of any case of a person accused of an offense under this chapter; or

(2) Knowingly and intentionally fails to enforce or comply with any provision of this chapter regulating the proceedings before, during, or after trial of an accused; shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

The "speedy trial" provisions of the Rules for Court Martial are not unclear: The military had 120 days, from the date of his arrest, to arraign Bradley Manning. They took 638.

It doesn't matter if the prosecution, as Lind puts it, has "worked diligently" to build a case against Manning. You throw someone in the slammer and keep him there without bail after you have a case to prosecute, not for nearly two years while you try to figure out whether or not you can come up with something to charge him with.

For the sake of comparison, Scooter Libby never served a day in jail even after he outed a CIA agent and was convicted of perjury (just like Alger Hiss). Israeli spy Lawrence Franklin bailed out twice prior to trial, and after he plead guilty ended up serving 10 months -- not in prison, but on "house arrest" -- and giving some speeches to high school students about how breaking the law is bad.

Manning's been in jail for 1008 days now, and the prosecution still shows no sign of having its head and its ass wired together. Apparently they have a problem. Their problem shouldn't be Bradley Manning's problem.

English: Slogan for the support of the persecuted American ex-soldier who is claimed to have leaked secret documents to WikiLeaks Deutsch: Slogan für die Unterstützung und Freilassung von Bradley Manning, der beschuldigt wird, geheime Dokumente an WikiLeaks weitergegeben zu haben (Photo credit: Wikipedia)