Yippy Skippy, they educated, sorry, executed the DC sniper. Which is, you know, good, because now he won't be able to snipe any more people. Unlike, say, if he was in jail, where he would probably have been sniping people left right and center from his prison cell. Justice has truly been done, now that the murderer has become the murdered.
(Why is the main article for this in 'Entertainment'? Are we now in Ancient Rome where the deaths of condemned men are nothing but entertainment for the baying crowd?)
Death isn't a penalty, it is an inevitable aspect of the human condition. When we use the death penalty, we're not actually so much using death as the penalty, so much as we are using the fear of death as the death penalty. It's intended as a kind of mental torture that's allowed to go on in spite of the 'no cruel and unusual punishment' clause in the human rights act.
The only way that death could be viewed as actually being a penalty is if the rest of us got to live forever. We don't. Little kids die of natural causes all the time, and we judge you to be lucky if you manage to make it through to the time where you are old and infirm and sick and weak and losing your mind. Humans have some odd ideas about what is and what is not a penalty. Which is worse, to quickly and humanely experience your end? Or to live for years behind bars knowing that tomorrow will only bring more bars?
But who cares! Now the DC sniper is dead, all the people he killed are alive again, right? Oh wait, they're not? So all we really did was add another number to the death toll? Oh, okay. I guess that makes things even.
How is it that we tell our children two wrongs don't make a right, but somehow a murder can somehow right another murder? Oh, we're total hypocrites devoid of souls. Oh, okay, that makes sense.
The death penalty is shameful, which is why it has been abandoned by 90% of the modern world. The USA is the last major democratic power that still employs the death penalty on a regular basis. Even in Russia, the death penalty is effectively defunct. That's right, in regards to the death penalty, the USA comes behind a country in which thousands of people die every year from drinking raw spirits.Want proof? Check out this handy dandy
Death Penalty Chart.
Yikes, jeepers and shiver me timbers. Everyone go read 'To Kill A Mockingbird', then please try and find your soul. You were equipped with one when you got here, but if you think that killing people is okay if they kill someone else, then you may have mislaid it along the way. Did you leave your soul on the coat rack in grade school? Perhaps you lost it on your way to college? Or maybe you packed it in with all your other old junk in the boxes in the attic. Wherever you stashed it, do try to dig it out and let's see if we can resolve the horrors of the world without adding to them.
You're boss.
>>> How about you, Hope? Wanna volunteer, you nebbish?
John Muhammad was a Muslim terrorist who killed 10 innocent people
he hated for not being Muslims. He should have died 10 deaths, so
he got off easy.
I don't feel that killing people to show that killing people is wrong is... well.. right.
However, as someone who was 'at risk' of being shot by this guy due to my frequent trips into Baltimore and occasional trips into DC, I can't say that I'll actually be crying over his death.
I think life in prison is probably a better solution - but most prisons have gone to the point of practically pampering their prisoners. It isn't punishment anymore. Sad.
I'd rather have given this guy life in prison without possibility of parole. But again... I'm not crying over his death.
I mind the cable TV, magazines, McDonalds, etc.
I'll even allow that books should be given to them. But Cable? No. In some prisons, they get state of the art gym equipment.
Once upon a time, if you were in prison, it was a punishment. The only break from the boredom you had was either reading texts on the legal system in order to plea your case, or taking part in a work program -- the outcome of which benefited the citizens, such as making license plates.
Now, in many prisons, they've turned it into something like an adult care community, and it is no longer a punishment.
When you murder, you forfeit your rights.
I know that great thinkers like to tell us that life behind bars is a worse punishment than death, but how many of us, in our heart of hearts, would really choose death over prolonged imprisonment? A small minority, I'm sure.
The death penalty was not intended to be included in the 8th Amendment prohibition against "cruel and unusual punishment." Had the Framers wanted it thus included, they would have said so explicitly. You may believe that the mental torture involved in the death penalty is cruel, but it certainly was not UNUSUAL between 1789 and 1791, when the Framers wrote the Bill of Rights and the states then opted to ratify ten of the twelve Amendments put before them.
There are several justifications for the death penalty, not just to preserve the public safety or to deter others from similar acts. One of these justifications is RETRIBUTION, which is a perfectly legitimate way for society to exact punishment and, at the same time, to express its revulsion at certain heinous acts.
There is a vast difference between murder, the UNLAWFUL taking of a human life a...
I know that great thinkers like to tell us that life behind bars is a worse punishment than death, but how many of us, in our heart of hearts, would really choose death over prolonged imprisonment? A small minority, I'm sure.
The death penalty was not intended to be included in the 8th Amendment prohibition against "cruel and unusual punishment." Had the Framers wanted it thus included, they would have said so explicitly. You may believe that the mental torture involved in the death penalty is cruel, but it certainly was not UNUSUAL between 1789 and 1791, when the Framers wrote the Bill of Rights and the states then opted to ratify ten of the twelve Amendments put before them.
There are several justifications for the death penalty, not just to preserve the public safety or to deter others from similar acts. One of these justifications is RETRIBUTION, which is a perfectly legitimate way for society to exact punishment and, at the same time, to express its revulsion at certain heinous acts.
There is a vast difference between murder, the UNLAWFUL taking of a human life and execution, which is a penalty sanctioned by the representatives of the people. If you're looking for MORAL justification (which you may or may not accept), my guide is the Holy Bible, which certainly seems to condone, or even endorse, the death penalty.
Those who condemn the death penalty tend to think of themselves as more humane, as moral superiors, as more concerned about the sanctity of human life. However, many of these same people are often - though not always - first in line to express support for abortion, the taking of INNOCENT human life. By contrast, the death penalty is the lawful taking of the life of one who has committed a barbaric act.
Furthermore, ironically enough, it seems to me that disdaining the death penalty actually shows LESS concern about human life in that it expresses less revulsion at the act that took a human life. It demonstrates muted outrage at an act toward which society should wish to express complete revulsion.
fill them up and hit the switch