BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Musket
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 06:06 PM

There are lots of people dead who deserve to live.

Be careful before you choose those who deserve to die.





Typical of personality disorder specimen such as the one on the sunset coast. Argue over wrong conviction rather than wrong sentence.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 06:25 PM

I wouldn't say definitely, but I think musket types at Mudcat to keep arthritic fingers limber. I can think of no other reason, as he never has anything constructive on his mind.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 06:26 PM

What about the kids that are being disappeared in the current U.S. "border crisis"? Some will be sold into sexual slavery; some will be sacrificed by occultists; some will probably even be cannibalized. Would any of you argue against executing the people who perpetrate crimes like that?

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Greg F.
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 08:30 PM

I would say...that the ultimate protection of wrongful execution is now quite, good...perhaps even excellent.

Would you be willing to bet your own life on that, John?

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 08:43 PM

Greg F. --
You've post twice to this thread, and added exactly zero to the discussion. That's on a par with the vast blather you contributed to other threads in recent months.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 08:58 PM

He made a valid point, John. Exonerations are a regular thing in many communities now in the US.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 09:15 PM

It occurs to me that if the US, as a whole, were to ban executions unequivocally it could conceivably be our country's first step away from our fixation on guns. ??

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 09:15 PM

MtheGM says, Can you really denounce the whole of history before about mid-C19 as relating to the "uncivilised"?

True, Mike. Until the middle of the 19th century, most executions were carried out for "civilised" political reasons. I think that's been the case through most of history - people were executed for political reasons. It's only in our enlightened modern times that we execute people for actually committing horrible atrocities.

I still oppose the death penalty, but I have to say that most people executed in the U.S., are people who committed horrendous crimes. And I have to have great sympathy for the victims of these crimes, and for their families.

But victims of crimes don't really know what they want, since there's really nothing that can repay a horrendous crime. The public outcry in the U.S. demands the death penalty, and nothing less, for horrendous crimes. I believe that execution doesn't do anybody any good, but I don't know how to convince the victims' rights people of that.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 09:29 PM

SRS, that was the conclusion of my post. Our system is very good at getting it right as to who is eventually executed. There have apparently been no execution of innocents in the past forty years or so. Greg F. didn't add to it, he was just taking his usual shot at me (as with others whom he disagrees)...this time I shot back. Bad me!

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 10:09 PM

"There have apparently been no execution of innocents in the past forty years or so."

Oh, good grief! Read.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 10:31 PM

No execution of innocents, John? I think you could get tarred and feathered for making a comment like that here. The Death Penalty Information Center will tell you otherwise, as will the Wikipedia article.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Janie
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 11:06 PM

Can some one provide a definition of 'evil' that 99% of people currently living could agree to without any caveats or qualifiers?

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 11:12 PM

I am not in favour of the death penalty as a general rule. There are too many possible screw-ups, mostly to the detriment of the person who gets killed. However, we practice the death penalty frequently and despite not liking it we do walk away saying, "Such is life."

How far is a trained sniper's shot from murder 1? I submit it is no further and no different. It is murder. But it is a sanctioned murder. I doubt anyone here would suggest a sniper not take the shot if that shot were to save an innocent life. But, how that differs from capital punishment is that it is preventative and not retributive. Personally, I think keeping Charles Manson alive is stupid, but I am willing to agree with it because the law says he's to be kept alive until such time as he drops dead. We do at times love our mass murderers, not that we'd want them moving into the 'hood after their rehabilitation. That would be carrying democracy too far.

So, we have a problem for which there is no right or morally superior position. To insult John for his position is wrong. He is a thoughtful and intelligent man. Argue with him all you want, as I'm sure I will in posts to come, but there is not a single person posting here who does not believe that capital punishment is necessary at times. Keep in mind that there are lots of kinds of capital punishment. Some of them aren't all that bad even if others aren't all that good.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 11:22 PM

John you're not paying attention. There have been. And in Dallas, Texas alone, the 34th exoneration of an innocent man was announced today. Since this program began in 2007 to examine DNA evidence convictions have been overturned. In just one county. Extrapolate from there and you'll see the problem with the death penalty and with mandatory sentences.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 11:24 PM

The method is obviously flawed.

It is time to return to the tried and true absolutes.

Hung By A Rope Until Dead

Beheading (by whatever means)

Firing Squad

Electrocution

Gas Chamber

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Swift, clean, and broadcast

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 25 Jul 14 - 11:56 PM

Well, it looks like I over-extrapolated in my post about no wrongful executions which I hastily made from reviewing the list provided by Guest,#. After following Joe Offer's links, I retract that statement. Please, folks, don't tar and feather me...I'm almost sure that would be cruel and and unusual punishment.

I do stand by my earlier conclusion that overall the system works quite well. The link by SRS, re Michael Phillips, is an example of it. He was not executed, he has been exonerated and is now free.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 01:00 AM

If you check out the history of executions in Texas, though, you'll find records of executions that were later shown to be in error. I'm not going to dig out the source tonight, but one of the long-term warders at the Huntsville Penitentiary wrote a book a dozen years ago or so, and went on speaking tours. The question came up and he knows of at least one who was later shown to be innocent. Jim Willett. He runs the museum at the penitentiary now.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Musket
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 02:41 AM

Joe mentions the families of the victims. True Joe, your feelings towards the person convicted are not going to be compassionate if your nearest and dearest were murdered by them.

But that is why we have juries to decide the evidence and judges to decide the sentence. It's a matter of objectivity.

The person on the sunset coast should be aware that the sun is slowly setting on his macabre support for this shameful practice. It seems The USA is about where we were in the early. '60s. The same debates are beginning to be heard nationally.

Gargoyle either ironically or otherwise shows this in sharp relief. Who couldn't be disturbed by reading his or her multicoloured but mono pointed post?

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 03:08 AM

I haven't ploughed through all of this thread, so someone may have made this point already - if so, sorry! Nevertheless, according to accounts of this case that I have read, Joseph Wood committed his crime 25 years ago and his trial was two years later. So, presumably, he was sentenced to death 23 years ago and has been on 'Death Row' ever since? It seems to me to be crueller to keep someone waiting to be executed for 23 years than actually executing him!

Anyway, concerns about this case seem to me to be a bit out of proportion - especially when you consider that a century ago some rich and powerful European old men forced millions of (mainly) poor and powerless European young men to execute each other. More recently some Ukrainian rebels have executed 295 innocent civilians and the Israeli government have executed around 800 Palestinians - now that's 'depravity'!

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 03:20 AM

The point has been made that there have been innocent people executed. That is a proven fact. But never mind that those people died- how about the people left behind? How would I feel if it were my brother or my husband or my father or my son or my beloved friend who was 'successfully' tried but that I was positive all along that he was innocent- and that I hoped against hope that the evidence would show up that proved his innocence - but they killed him?

Would I ever again trust my government? Or anyone in authority? Or people?

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 03:34 AM

"Please, folks, don't tar and feather me...I'm almost sure that would be cruel and and unusual punishment."
And it tends to be the type of behaviour those who support capital punishment are in favour of - one of the great practices in dealing with the 'blacks' - before stringin''em up.
"Until the middle of the 19th century, most executions were carried out for "civilised" political reasons. I think that's been the case through most of history - people were executed for political reasons."
You have to be joking Joe

"Sir Samuel Romilly, speaking to the House of Commons on capital punishment in 1810, declared that "[there is] no country on the face of the earth in which there [have] been so many different offences according to law to be punished with death as in England." Known as the "Bloody Code", at its height the criminal law included some 220 crimes punishable by death, including "being in the company of Gypsies for one month", "strong evidence of malice in a child aged 7–14 years of age" and "blacking the face or using a disguise whilst committing a crime". Many of these offences had been introduced to protect the property of the wealthy classes that emerged during the first half of the 18th century, a notable example being the Black Act of 1723, which created 50 capital offences for various acts of theft and poaching. Crimes eligible for the death penalty included shoplifting and stealing sheep, cattle, and horses, and before abolition of the death penalty for theft in 1832, "English law was notorious for prescribing the death penalty for a vast range of offenses as slight as the theft of goods valued at twelve pence."
Whilst executions for murder, burglary and robbery were common, the death sentences for minor offenders were often not carried out. A sentence of death could be commuted or respited (permanently postponed) for reasons such as benefit of clergy, official pardons, pregnancy of the offender or performance of military or naval duty. Between 1770 and 1830, an estimated 35,000 death sentences were handed down in England and Wales, but only 7,000 executions were carried out."
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Stu
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 07:19 AM

"I do stand by my earlier conclusion that overall the system works quite well"

But I ask the question again: if a section of society decides to kill a person, how does that differ if it's a judicial system killing a criminal or a single person committing a crime?

The intent is the same, to end the life of a human being using violence. How can we claim the moral authority to judge? What is our basis for this? Is there a place for institutionalised killing outside of a war situation. The alternative, incarceration is far less morally ambiguous, and allows for errors to be corrected of discovered down the line.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Greg F.
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 09:26 AM

That's OK, SRS - John's just taking his usual shot at me, without adding anything but misinformation to the discussion.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 09:34 AM

"How can we claim the moral authority to judge?"
.,,.
Depends whom you mean by 'we'. If you mean society as a whole, then that is what we elect representatives for: to enact laws embodying such procedures on our behalf which ipso facto makes them legal ~~ ie gives them 'moral authority'. That is the place for "institutional killing outside a war situation". I am not saying whether I think it right or wrong to enact so, becoz, as I said above, I can see virtues in both sides of the argument and remain uncommitted on it. But I am just seeking to answer some, what seem to me, rather ingenuous [or perhaps disingenuous] questions.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: DMcG
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 09:40 AM

What I found most disturbing (in a BBC report of this) was the number of US citizens interviewed - or more accurately shown in an edited interview - who thought there was no problem. Given the person executed had made his victims suffer, it was fine if he suffered during the execution, seemed to be their argument.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 10:37 AM

"Given the person executed had made his victims suffer, it was fine if he suffered during the execution, seemed to be their argument."

I suppose that a revenge motive is mainly at play here (and, in the face of significant wrong-doing, desire for revenge is, surely, a very human emotion?). In addition, debates like this always seem to concentrate on the rights of the criminal. I believe, though, that someone who has committed murder has effectively surrendered most of their rights and I'm not very concerned about what happens to them afterwards. I am concerned, though, about the rights of any victims - and think that those rights should be of paramount importance.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 10:47 AM

Fair play to John on the Sunset Coast. His may be a lonely voice here, but he articulates a view shared by millions on both sides of tha Atlantic. However he has already moderated his view in light of this debate, and may yet be persuaded to go another step.

Earlier he said: "If the last several executions have not gone well...." This falls far, far short of the reality, John. Since Gregg v Georgia in 1976 (at which point the US became the first and only nation to go back to capital punishment having previously abandoned it) many dozens of executions have gone horribly wrong. A Colorado University prof has collated 46 ghastly examples, making it clear that his list is nothing like exhaustive. When one digs into the detail behind these cases, it is evident that they have many times been life-changing for participants and audiences alike. It is diquieting enough just to read about them.

One of the most striking features for me is the large number of instances in which the curtain has come down mid-execution, or the witnesses have been ushered out. The ghoulish aspect whereby executions are attended by invited audiences is justified on the basis that justice must be seen to be done. So censoring the spectacle can only be an acknowledgement that justice has failed. If those who agree to attend were required to sit through the whole show, the professor's list could never have reached 46.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Janie
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 09:56 PM

Go pretend to be King Tut guest. It would be more credible.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Janie
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 10:08 PM

With the bogus srs post deleted, suggest my response also be deleted so as not to confuse.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Jul 14 - 10:52 PM

Thanks, Janie.

Songwronger keeps posting bogus messages, or outright attacks, and hasn't figured out that when he shifts the subject of a BS thread from the original topic to an attack, or becomes simply so obnoxious that it isn't fit for a lucid polite conversation, the thread gets closed, or, at the very least, one of the moderators deletes the post. (Not always me.) If he'd stop the attacks and try to carry on a rational conversation, I'm sure he'd find Mudcat a more welcoming environment.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Janie
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 12:40 AM

Peter K, thank you for your thoughtful post. John on the Sunset Coast, while I often disagree with your conservative perspectives, I always appreciate that you articulate your positions clearly and rationally, and there have definitely been times when you have posted information that has given me pause, and sometimes widened my own paradigm. Even when that doesn't happen, you express your views in a way that that gives me greater understanding of what informs thoughtful people whose paradigms are very different from mine.

Thanks for all your years here of sharing your perspective and not letting the judgementalness of the attack dogs drive your voice away.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Musket
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 02:30 AM

"Judgementalness of the attack dogs"

(Is that a word?)

I assume you are referring to the judges who pass sentence of death?

I can begin to see why ignorant authorities still get away with this barbaric act. Those sickened by it wish to have a reasonable debate and see where they are coming from rather than show their contempt.

You can 't reason with pig ignorance. You can merely legislate it into history as we did in The UK.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Janie
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 02:51 AM

Depending on assorted google searches, had I left out the e after the g, it might be a word, but I readily confess that I can be a tad creative with spelling at any time, but especially this late at night.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 03:06 AM

A wonderful book entitled 'The Fatal Gallows Tree' (John Dean Potter 1965 - probably unobtainable now) gives a superb thumb-nail sketch of 'the British habit of hanging', from the early days when the condemned were dragged on a horses tail to their deaths, right through the once considered 'entertaining' spectacle, to the final days, when it was finally abandoned, despite opposition from 'the guardians of British values.
One of the most memorable sections touched on was the events surrounding the last woman to be hanged, Ruth Ellis in 1955.
She had had a miscarriage in her cell previous to the execution and, to add to her punishment, she went to the gallows wearing canvas draws, because the insides of the last woman who had suffered the same fate before her 'fell out' during the 'ceremony' - justice at its very highest!
The book finishes;
"The House of Lords, much to most people's surprise, passed it (the abolition bill) with majority of 100 votes. After a thousand years the story of English hanging had come to an end. It had gone the way of boiling, branding, beheading and the burning of witches. At last civilization had triumphed.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 03:31 AM

In interests of accuracy:

spellings 'judgment' & 'judgement' are a fairly rare example of co-existing options in English spelling;

pretty well all adjectives can be conventionally formed into recognisable abstract-noun coinages by addition of suffix '-ness', if a noun from which the adjective was formed [eg 'beautiful' from 'beauty', so that 'beautifulness' would be otiose] doesn't already exist: or has a different connotation -- as here, eg, 'judgment', from which 'judgmental' forms, would not be cognate with 'judgmentalness'.

I see where good old Jim is using "civilization" in that silly, tendentious & emotive, sense again. Tch tch; some people just will never learn!

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 05:06 AM

The usual US spelling is "judgment".
The usual UK spelling is "judgement", except in legal documents.

As for "judgmentalness", it conveys more than "judgement". Being "judgemental" is more than simply "judging".

May I suggest "judgementality"?

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 05:21 AM

"I see where good old Jim is using "civilization" in that silly, tendentious & emotive, sense again"
Blame John Dean Potter" - it was a direct quote, I forgot to add the closing quotation marks - sorry, but then again, it saves having to respond to the humanity and the logic of the statement, doesn't it?
The fact that some people seem either unable or unwilling to approach these subjects with emotion and humanity very much accounts for some of the views they express.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Musket
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 05:26 AM

I did like the word Janie, all the same!

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 07:12 AM

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7546975.stm

Read that article and those against CP may have a change of heart.

(That was a 'joke' for those who think every discussion is a life or death issue.)

And that was just an unfortunate, untimely choice of words.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 07:45 AM

The international legal definition of the crime of genocide is found in Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide:

Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

http://www.preventgenocide.org/genocide/officialtext-printerfriendly.htm

Obamacare forces Americans to participate in birth control (item D from above). From Wikipedia:

With the exception of churches and houses of worship, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act mandates contraceptive coverage for all employers and educational institutions…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contraceptive_mandate_%28United_States%29

Therefore, Obamacare is genocide. Obama and his enablers are committing genocide the same as Hitler, Stalin, Mao and the rest.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 07:55 AM

Songwronger, you are in contravention of Article II b.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 08:06 AM

Oh, if only the effortlessly prolix MtheGM could learn from topsie's succinct use of English....

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Jeri
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 08:39 AM

I found the page Peter K linked to yesterday, and was appalled to see it all compiled so. One doesn't get a very good idea of all the screw-ups when the odd one is reported in the news.

I'm not necessarily against the death penalty in all cases, but I AM against torture. If the prisons are buying these drugs from illegal sources, I don't know why they just can't buy heroin. (Yes I do: because it won't cause the convict enough pain, and might even be enjoyable for a few seconds.)

As for "judgementalness", I think I would have said "anality". (Yes, I spell the "j" word with an "e" because it looks freaky without it, even though my spellchecker doesn't approve.)

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 08:52 AM

We all have our different styles, Fionn. How much of your living have you made with your writing, out of interest?

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 09:00 AM

Jeri, I learned the following from you. You tell it better but this from the www is easier for me to type up, read cut and paste.

'The Famous Pig

A salesman is lost in a rural area and stops at a farm to get directions. As he is talking to the farmer he notices a pig with a wooden leg. "How did the pig get a wooden leg?", he asks the farmer.
"Well", says the farmer, "that is a very special pig. One night not too long ago we had a fire start in the barn.
"Well, sir, that pig set up a great squealing that woke everyone, and by the time we got there he had herded all the other animals out of the barn and saved everyone of them."
"And that was when he hurt his leg?" asked the salesman.
"Oh no" says the farmer. "He was fine after that. Though a while later I was in the woods out back and a bear attacked me. Well, sir, that pig was near by and he came running and set on that bear and chased him off. Saved me for sure."
"So the bear injured his leg then," says the salesman.
"Oh no. He came away without a scratch from that. Though a few days later my tractor turned over in a ditch and I was knocked unconscious. Well, that pig dove into the ditch and pulled me out before I drowned."
"So he hurt his leg then?" asks the salesman.
"Oh no," says the farmer.
"So how did he get the wooden leg?" the salesman asks.
"Well", the farmer tells him, "When you have a pig like that, you don't want to eat him all at once." '

*************************

There are those who don't like the idea of killing other humans. I can see that. It is a strict taboo in most groups or societies. The world has always had

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 09:18 AM

[Sorry. Laptop doing strange things or me hitting some something or other.]

The world has always had a problem with murderers and what to do with them. And today we have a hard time defining the term. Is a soldier guilty of murder when s/he kills someone in a fire fight? Is a police sharpshooter equally guilty? Each of us decides where that particular line is, so it's not as cut and dried as some make out. Some cultures simply banish murderers (the Inui for example). Other societies behead. Others refine the process. But on occasion it does descend to what one might view as torture, and the execution referred to in the OP is imo an example of that. If the purpose of the judicial killing is to rid society of a particularly 'evil' individual, then do so fast and to the point. However, if it cannot be 100% ascertained that the individual is guilty, then maybe judicial killings are beyond the pale.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: Don Firth
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 12:54 PM

First of all, I take exception to the thread title. An entire country does not "slide into depravity" because of the practices of some semi-autonomous states within that country.

I am opposed to the death penalty for a couple of reasons, but for one major reason.

First, a person who commits murder proves that he or she is not fit to mingle with the rest of the human race. And these persons should be isolated from the rest because they have demonstrated that they are dangerous. Life in prison with no possibility of parole is sufficient.

This removes the person from society so they can no longer be dangerous to others.

And most important, should it be determined that the person actually is innocent, they can be released from prison—with just compensation for the error.

Someone, I forget who, once said that it is better that fifty guilty persons go free than for one innocent person to be put to death.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 02:02 PM

1. Isn't imprisonment for life a form of torture?

2. No-one yet has addressed my point about the rights of victims - and I should have said their families - being more important than the rights of murderers and other criminals.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 02:25 PM

' "Better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer," 2 says English jurist William Blackstone. The ratio 10:1 has become known as the "Blackstone ratio." '

From the www.

Subject: RE: BS: USA sliding into depravity (botched execution)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 27 Jul 14 - 02:40 PM

"No-one yet has addressed my point about the rights of victims"

That opens many doors.

"An honor killing is the homicide of a member of a family or social group by other members, due to the perpetrators' belief that the victim has brought shame or dishonor upon the family or community, usually for reasons such as refusing to enter an arranged marriage, being in a relationship that is disapproved by their relatives, having sex outside marriage, becoming the victim of rape, dressing in ways which are deemed inappropriate, or engaging in homosexual relations.[1][2][3][4][5] Honor killings are especially targeted against women and homosexuals. The practice, which occurs in various cultures, is universally condemned by human rights organizations."

Just another thing that says we interpret justifications for capital punishment differently around the world.