When a federal judge deploys an exclamation point in an opinion, you know something unusual is going on. On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon tried to dispense of a case entitled Akins v. Federal Election Commission. The excruciatingly long-running case really involves, though, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, AKA AIPAC.

A number of former ambassadors, congressmen and government officials critical of the pro-Israel lobbying group sued the Federal Election Commission after the FEC declined to regulate AIPAC as a political commitee. The date of that original lawsuit? 1992.

In the meantime, three of the original plaintiffs have died and the case has had a tortured path up and down the appellate path. On Wednesday, for reasons that may or may not be worth exploring, Judge Leon dismissed the case with these heart-felt words:

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