Patterico's Pontifications

1/17/2015

Execution In Oklahoma

Filed under: General — Dana @ 9:53 am



[guest post by Dana]

On Thursday, after Charles Frederick Warner’s application for a stay of execution was denied by the Supreme Court, he was executed by lethal injection in Oklahoma. It was the first state-sanctioned execution in Oklahoma since last year’s botched execution of Clayton Lockett.

Joined by Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Elena Kagan, Wise Latina Sonia Sotomayor wrote the dissent. As issue was the “reliability of the first drug to be used in the three-drug Oklahoma protocol, saying there was significant scientific doubt about whether it would succeed in causing unconsciousness in an inmate, and thus potentially exposing him to “searing, unnecessary pain before death.”.

From the dissent:

“I find the District Court’s conclusion that midazolam will in fact work as intended difficult to accept given recent experience of the use of this drug.”

“It is true that we give deference to the district courts. But at some point we must question their findings of fact, unless we are to abdicate our role of ensuring that no clear error has been committed. We should review such findings with added care when what is at issue is the risk of the needless infliction of severe pain.”

“Petitioners have committed horrific crimes, and should be punished. But the Eighth Amendment guarantees that no one should be subjected to an execution that causes searing, unnecessary pain before death. I hope that our failure to act today does not portend our unwillingness to consider these questions.”

Apparently, Warner felt some pain during the execution procedure (as well as felt really badly about what he did…):

“It hurt. It feels like acid,” Warner said from the gurney. “I’m sorry for all the pain that was caused. I’m not a monster. I didn’t do everything they said I did. I love people, love my family. I love Jesus.”

“No one should go through this. I’m not afraid to die. We’s all going to die.”

Searing, unnecessary pain before death must be in the eye of the beholder because Warner was convicted in 1997 on charges of first-degree murder and first-degree rape and no amount of searing pain suffered by him could ever, ever come close to the extraordinary searing and unnecessary pain he inflicted on his tiny victim, 11-month old Adrianna Waller:

Adriana’s jaw and three of her ribs were broken, and her lungs and her spleen were bruised. Her liver was lacerated, and she suffered from brain hemorrhaging because of Warner’s attack.

Note: Death row inmates were executed Thursday in Florida and Oklahoma with the same three drugs used during Oklahoma’s botched execution in April. Florida has now used the method without incident 11 times.

Further, as a reminder, state attorneys claimed the cause of the botched Lockett execution was not due to the drugs being used, but rather the inexperience of the attending medical technician who missed the vein.

–Dana

138 Responses to “Execution In Oklahoma”

  1. Hello.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  2. hey wait you guys i’m a people person!

    happyfeet (831175)

  3. While I oppose capital punishment, period, I find the objections that it might have caused the murderer some discomfort ridiculous. When the Framers wrote the Eighth Amendment, hanging was the normal means of executing criminals, and none of them ever said that hanging constituted cruel or unusual punishment; it was, in fact very usual!

    Our legislators came up with lethal injection, because they were squeamish about fulfilling the laws that they had passed themselves. They were horrified by some of the terrible crimes committed, but not so horrified that they wanted to do more than put he killers to sleep like an unwanted puppy, behind closed doors.

    If we are going to have capital punishment, then damn it, we should have capital punishment: murderers should be hanged, with the executions open to the public. If people think that capital punishment is some sort of deterrent to crime — and I do not, or Texas would have the lowest murder rate of any state — then whatever deterrent effect there is is weakened by the way in which we do it.

    If we are going to have capital punishment, then we damned sure shouldn’t be squeamish about it; we ought to proclaim it proudly, and do it publicly, so that every citizen has the opportunity to see what is being done in his name.

    The Catholic Dana (1b79fa)

  4. There are news reports this morning that say Oklahoma officials are claiming that Warner started complaining about pain -before- the drugs were injected. Sounds like it was a macabre theater performance.

    As for a quick, painless execution method, I think we should use one of the few things that the French ever got right. The guillotine. Hanging is by no means a certain quick method, botched knot placement can lead to slow strangulation. The head chopper never fails and is instantaneous so far as the subject is concerned. A tad messy for the audience but improved design could conceal the bloody parts from sight.

    But I still advocate Heinlein’s Equalization method of punishment. That would certainly catch the attention of these criminals.

    agesilaus (47b0b9)

  5. Searing, unnecessary pain before death must be in the eye of the beholder because Warner was convicted in 1997 on charges of first-degree murder and first-degree rape and no amount of searing pain suffered by him could ever, ever come close to the extraordinary searing and unnecessary pain he inflicted on his tiny victim, 11-month old Adrianna Waller. . .

    Hey, didn’t you read what Warner said? “I didn’t do everything they said I did. I love people, love my family. I love Jesus.”

    I mean if you can’t believe a convicted murder on death row, who can you believe?

    JVW (60ca93)

  6. If we are going to have capital punishment, then we damned sure shouldn’t be squeamish about it; we ought to proclaim it proudly, and do it publicly, so that every citizen has the opportunity to see what is being done in his name.

    In all seriousness, this is how I feel too. I’m also opposed to the death penalty for a few reasons, but chief among them is that I find it hard to square my opposition to abortion with a willingness to kill a condemned prisoner. I agree with Dana that supporters of capital punishment ought to at least be willing to witness the result of that public policy, in the same way that I think abortion rights supporters — especially those who support partial-birth abortion — should see the results of their advocacy.

    JVW (60ca93)

  7. agesilaus wrote:

    The head chopper never fails and is instantaneous so far as the subject is concerned.

    Did you ever see Wolfen?

    A particularly detailed report comes from Dr. Beaurieux who, under perfect circumstances, experimented with the head of the murderer Languille, guillotined at 5.30 am on 28 June, 1905. (From A History of the Guillotine by Alister Kershaw. His source is Archives d’Anthropologie Criminelle, 1905):

    “I called in a strong, sharp voice: ‘Languille!’ I saw the eyelids slowly lift up …”

    Here, then, is what I was able to note immediately after the decapitation: the eyelids and lips of the guillotined man worked in irregularly rhythmic contractions for about five or six seconds … I waited for several seconds. The spasmodic movements ceased.

    The face relaxed, the lids half closed on the eyeballs, leaving only the white of the conjunctiva visible, exactly as in the dying whom we have occasion to see every day in the exercise of our profession, or as in those just dead.

    It was then that I called in a strong, sharp voice: ‘Languille!’ I saw the eyelids slowly lift up, without any spasmodic contractions … Next Languille’s eyes very definitely fixed themselves on mine and the pupils focused themselves … After several seconds, the eyelids closed again, slowly and evenly, and the head took on the same appearance as it had had before I called out.

    It was at that point that I called out again and, once more, without any spasm, slowly, the eyelids lifted and undeniably living eyes fixed themselves on mine with perhaps even more penetration than the first time. Then there was a further closing of the eyelids, but now less complete. I attempted the effect of a third call; there was no further movement and the eyes took on the glazed look which they have in the dead.

    I have just recounted to you with rigorous exactness what I was able to observe. The whole thing had lasted twenty-five to thirty seconds.

    For further details see http://www.metaphor.dk/guillotine

    The movie fan Dana (1b79fa)

  8. @ JVW,

    I’m also opposed to the death penalty for a few reasons, but chief among them is that I find it hard to square my opposition to abortion with a willingness to kill a condemned prisoner.

    So, innocence or guilt of those facing death doesn’t factor in this view, but just the “life” itself?

    Dana (8e74ce)

  9. I think it is a reasonable argument that the same regard for innocent life that makes one anti-abortion can make one pro- death penalty for those who commit 1st degree murder. One way of showing respect for innocent life is to give the greatest measure of protection that one can, which includes the disincentive for the first murder by use of capital punishment, and the absolute prevention of another murder, even if to another inmate.
    One can make arguments against capital punishment, but I think there is nothing in the Bible that clearly prohibits it.

    I’m assuming that whatever pain one experiences in getting midazolam IV is the same whether one is being pre-medicated before a surgical procedure from which one will wake up from or as part of a lethal injection protocol.
    If it is that bad, there’s a whole lot of new malpractice claims ready to make someone rich.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  10. There’s more on this other aces as well, including the possibility that his pleadings of pain were a ruse. The “acid” was reportedly a standard IV drip and nothing more. The other part of his pain, real or not, was apparently the drug that would put him unconscious. Can’t remember where I read this, but will post it if I find it. In the meantime, I’m sure everyone will be reassured by the decision of those well-known scientists, Doctors Stephen G. Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor.

    David Crowley (970d6c)

  11. Hmmm, if supreme court justices can render medical opinions without a medical license or education,
    then I think I should get the opportunity to weigh in on some SCOTUS decisions.
    Because of FAIRNESS.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  12. So, innocence or guilt of those facing death doesn’t factor in this view, but just the “life” itself?

    To say that we can take a human life because they are guilty of a crime, however heinous, is way too close for my tastes to the argument that we can take a human life in the womb because it will be a burden on the parent or the taxpayer (in the case of a disabled child).

    JVW (60ca93)

  13. If we are going to have capital punishment, then we damned sure shouldn’t be squeamish about it; we ought to proclaim it proudly, and do it publicly, so that every citizen has the opportunity to see what is being done in his name.

    The Catholic Dana (1b79fa) — 1/17/2015 @ 10:37 am

    Ditto.

    I don’t understand how lethal injection is so hard to figure out – is it the variety in individuals’ tolerance for certain substances? Seems to me that alcohol and sleeping pills would put them out enough to be numb. Give them booze and ambien with that last meal.

    What do the Europeans use for euthanasia? That’s self-administered enough and I haven’t heard about “searing, unnecessary pain.”

    carlitos (c24ed5)

  14. “variety” should say “variance” for any grammar nazis reading this.

    carlitos (c24ed5)

  15. I think it is a reasonable argument that the same regard for innocent life that makes one anti-abortion can make one pro- death penalty for those who commit 1st degree murder.

    I agree that there is a very strong argument to be made for capital punishment. I was for capital punishment until about 20 years ago, and to this day the execution of someone like Warner, while distasteful in my eyes, doesn’t rouse me to a degree to where I would become an anti-death penalty activist. The best argument for the death penalty from my perspective is that it buttresses the conservative principle that actions have real consequences, but that’s not enough to overcome my concerns that the death penalty makes us all a little bit more callous about the sanctity of life.

    JVW (60ca93)

  16. What do the Europeans use for euthanasia?
    carlitos (c24ed5) — 1/17/2015 @ 11:25 am

    Well, that is a very good point. If they want to argue that “X” is a pleasant way to die, then they can’t also argue that “X” is a painful way to die,
    except when they want to.

    But I am reminded that some say “the law” has little to do with what is “true”, let alone “morally right”, so I guess in the end somebody gets to make it up.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  17. JVW, I can see that perspective,
    I just argue that to allow cruel heinous murderers to live a life of relative comfort makes us a little more callous towards evil and the suffering that deliberate evil causes.

    I am happy for there to be high thresholds of evil and proof before capital punishment is given.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  18. Dana, I have a quibble with your description of Lockett’s execution as “botched”. He did not survive the experience which, ipso facto, means it was successful.

    As for the death machine, it’s the result of salesmanship, nothing else. First some guy created a product and then created a need for it. Like the electric chair before it. Like the guillotine mentioned above. Like iPhones. At least it’s not as stupid as the gas chamber.

    nk (dbc370)

  19. 9. I think it is a reasonable argument that the same regard for innocent life that makes one anti-abortion can make one pro- death penalty for those who commit 1st degree murder. One way of showing respect for innocent life is to give the greatest measure of protection that one can, which includes the disincentive for the first murder by use of capital punishment, and the absolute prevention of another murder, even if to another inmate.
    One can make arguments against capital punishment, but I think there is nothing in the Bible that clearly prohibits it.

    MD in Philly (f9371b) — 1/17/2015 @ 11:18 am

    Not only isn’t there anything in the Bible that prohibits capital punishment, there are parts of the Bible that clearly require it.

    https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus+20&version=NIV

    …“Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

    You shall not murder.

    “You shall not commit adultery.

    “You shall not steal…

    Many people are wrongly convinced the Ten Commandments prohibit all killing. It doesn’t. It forbids murder. And yes, I know the King James Version says (or said, if it hasn’t been updated) “Thou shalt not kill.” But in the original Hebrew they used the word for murder. When the King James Bible was written “Thou shalt not kill” meant you can’t murder anyone. I know it may come as a surprise, but the English language has changed a bit since 1600.

    It would be very strange if the God of the Old Testamant forbade all killing, at the same time putting into the law that anyone who commits murder loses the right to keep their own life.

    It is precisely the difference between the guilt or innocence of the person in question that makes killing them either moral and permitted or immoral and forbidden.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  20. The much better looking Dana wrote:

    I’m also opposed to the death penalty for a few reasons, but chief among them is that I find it hard to square my opposition to abortion with a willingness to kill a condemned prisoner.

    So, innocence or guilt of those facing death doesn’t factor in this view, but just the “life” itself?

    The question was asked of JVW, but I’ll answer it anyway.

    The guilt or innocence of the person facing death isn’t the identical concern; the innocent baby spared from abortion will go on to lead what we hope will be a happy life; the guilty murderer spared from execution will still have to live out the rest of his miserable life in prison.

    However, our arguments in support of life for the unborn are stronger when we pair them with a position opposed to capital punishment; we are then arguing for the preservation of life, period, rather than arguing whether the reasons we have for killing are justified or not.

    The left will never accept that, of course, but some in the middle might be convinced. And I’m willing to bet that you’d willingly trade stopping fewer than a hundred executions a year to save 1½ million unborn children.

    The uglier Dana (1b79fa)

  21. Not all that strange. Mens rea is a relatively modern concept. In antiquity, all killing except in war was considered a crime and/or sin. Absolute liability.

    nk (dbc370)

  22. They can always go with a 9mm Lobotomy.

    Gerald A 11/2006 (2c96c6)

  23. I just argue that to allow cruel heinous murderers to live a life of relative comfort makes us a little more callous towards evil and the suffering that deliberate evil causes.

    Well one thing that should happen is that criminals who commit capital crimes should not have access to the media. No more having Tookie Williams or Mumia Abu Jamal address via remote the graduating class at some stupid left-wing liberal arts college or appearing for an interview on Nightline or 20/20 or some other dumb news show. If I were king of the world those who commit capital crimes would be allowed one visit every three months from a court-appointed attorney, but would not be eligible for visits from family or friends. They could exchange letters with immediate family once or twice a year, but would not be allowed in-person contact. They would not have access to television or internet, though they could do all the reading that their heart desired, and they could have access to the clergy once per week and on holidays. Suffice to say, I would make the incarceration of convicted murders something more punitive than “a life of relative comfort.”

    JVW (60ca93)

  24. Nk,

    I have quibble with it, too, and considered italicizing the word, however I now think “botched” is appropriate in that the arrival at the end result went far differently than intended. However, ip my usage of it is certainly different than those who use it to condemn the entire process of executing someone.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  25. Joined by Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Elena Kagan, Wise Latina Sonia Sotomayor wrote the dissent.

    Nothing annoys me more than when liberals perceive their opposition to capital punishment as welling forth from the milk of human kindness, from goodness and compassion. I wouldn’t be as bothered if they instead proclaimed, “hell, yea, we’re opposed to sentencing ruthless criminals to death because we too are as ruthless and cold-hearted as the killer is. And if such people go on to murder more people in jail or upon release (eg, life in prison without parole can easily end up being at the whims of politicians or a tricky end-run-around of the system in the future, and, worse of all, is unconstitutional in places like Mexico), that will satisfy our ruthlessness to an even greater extent!!”

    Mark (c160ec)

  26. but chief among them is that I find it hard to square my opposition to abortion with a willingness to kill a condemned prisoner

    JVW, you’re fallen for the loony moral equivalency or moral relativism spouted by many liberals. There is a BIG difference between sentencing to death a person guilty of a life-ending crime versus snuffing out the life of an innocent nascent human.

    Mark (c160ec)

  27. bjork has been extraordinarily clear on the subject of the morality of the death penalty

    mr. buttons could explain more better

    but trust me this debate is over

    happyfeet (831175)

  28. However, our arguments in support of life for the unborn are stronger when we pair them with a position opposed to capital punishment; we are then arguing for the preservation of life, period, rather than arguing whether the reasons we have for killing are justified or not.

    And I’m willing to bet that you’d willingly trade stopping fewer than a hundred executions a year to save 1½ million unborn children.

    The uglier Dana (1b79fa) — 1/17/2015 @ 11:41 am

    If that was the trade I’d make it,
    but I do not agree that somehow our argument for life for the unborn is stronger when we pair it with a position opposed to capital punishment,
    first, it seems you are not arguing about the morality of capital punishment, but the political merits of what is to be gained. I guess one can argue that way, as some call politics the “art of what is possible”,
    but I think that is very different from asking whether it is moral to have capital punishment, and if one takes moral cues from the Bible, does the Bible speak against capital punishment. I don’t think it does, and I think the Biblical sanctity of life argument more supports capital punishment than not. But it is more an argument from inference than direct explicit command.

    If you want to be a complete non-aggressor and surrender to Hitler, Stalin, and Mao, one can make that decision,
    but if you are not willing to go there, then the question of when is violence and death by violence justified is unavoidably there, with the need to clarify why it is one place and not another. I don’t equate protecting the life of an unborn baby with allowing a serial mass murderer to live. I see letting mass murderers live as not doing enough to deter such behavior.
    I think there is room for reasonable disagreement between reasonable people,
    that said, I expect you to point out flaws or at least question my reasoning where you should,
    and I will do likewise in return.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  29. Bolt guns: painless, humane and quick.

    Kevin M (25bbee)

  30. And I’m willing to bet that you’d willingly trade stopping fewer than a hundred executions a year to save 1½ million unborn children.

    Perhaps, but that offer is not on the table and never will be. The people who argue that we must be consistent in this are largely inconsistent themselves — they oppose capital punishment but support abortion.

    Kevin M (25bbee)

  31. Dana–

    I do agree about our antiseptic methods of execution. I am not sure I would have it in the public square, but there are worse things on cable. I also dislike the media’s whitewashing of atrocities — if you show barbarians being barbarians, it is harder for their apologists to argue they are not.

    There should be something TERRIBLE about taking a life, so that we do not become too fond of it, to paraphrase General Lee.

    Kevin M (25bbee)

  32. Catholic Dana:

    If people think that capital punishment is some sort of deterrent to crime — and I do not, or Texas would have the lowest murder rate of any state — then whatever deterrent effect there is is weakened by the way in which we do it.

    There are studies that show the death penalty deters crime, but IMO we don’t need to go there. It’s an absolute fact that the person who is put to death will not kill again. You can argue that life in prison is an acceptable alternative but they don’t always stay in prison (see, for example, Kenneth Allen McDuff — the poster boy for the death penalty). Further, life in prison doesn’t protect the guards who imprison them or the citizens threatened by them if they escape.

    There may not be many people who need to be put to death in order to protect society, but there are more than just Kenneth McDuff. I, for one, don’t want another person to face a known killer like McDuff, and the death penalty is the only way I know of to make sure that happens.

    DRJ (a83b8b)

  33. JVW, you’re fallen for the loony moral equivalency or moral relativism spouted by many liberals. There is a BIG difference between sentencing to death a person guilty of a life-ending crime versus snuffing out the life of an innocent nascent human.

    Mark: no kidding there’s a difference, and please don’t try to tell me that I’ve fallen for some moral equivalence. I’m not saying that abortion and capital punishment are equivalent, but I’m saying that they share too many things in common for me to be comfortable with either of them. I hold more disgust for abortion than I do for capital punishment though I think the two of them are both morally wrong, much in the same way that one might be more disgusted by a heroin addict than an alcoholic even though both of those habits are moral failings.

    JVW (60ca93)

  34. I think that an argument for pro-life can be made with executions in that it not only deters further crime, but also protects innocent people from being killed by the offender. As with being anti- abortion, both viewpoints reaffirm the sanctity of life.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  35. …and the protection of innocent life.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  36. The argument for the the death penalty is self refuting:
    X ended the life of Y prematurely through violence. That is so immoral and against Life that we need to end the life of X prematurely through violence.

    Personally, I think perpetual solitary confinement is harsher and more terrifying than capital punishment. Plus presumably allow the murderer a chance for repentance before he appears in the “Court Above”. Although what I have in mind for solitary confinement is stricter than JVW’s suggestion…more like no human contact beyond letters from family and three meals a day served through an opening in the door.

    kishnevi (a5d1b9)

  37. Do you actually consider lethal injection a violent way to end a life?

    Dana (8e74ce)

  38. kishnevi:

    Although what I have in mind for solitary confinement is stricter than JVW’s suggestion…more like no human contact beyond letters from family and three meals a day served through an opening in the door.

    Texas can thank William Wayne Justice for making that impossible, not only in Texas but probably in every state.

    DRJ (a83b8b)

  39. Texas can thank William Wayne Justice for making that impossible, not only in Texas but probably in every state.

    Just as Californians can thank Vaughn Walker, who ruled that the Prop 8 initiative passed by 60% of voters, was unconstitutional then “married ” his gay lover.

    Walker intimidated the witnesses who planned to testify in favor of Prop 8 by threatening to video their testimony and put it on You Tube. Since those supporting the proposition (Did I mention it passed with 60% of the vote ?) were already suffering intimidation and a few had lost their jobs, his threat had to be taken seriously. Another champion of leftist values.

    A couple of years later, Firefox and Mozilla forced out the founder because he had donated to Prop 8. I deleted Firefox after that.

    Mike K (90dfdc)

  40. Carlitos hit the nail on the head. If the method of euthanasia is okeydokey, then the same method should be good for executions. Otherwise someone needs to sue Oregon:

    “Brittany Maynard, the terminally ill 29-year-old who spent her final days advocating for death-with-dignity laws, took lethal drugs prescribed by her physician on Saturday and died, a spokesman said, “as she intended — peacefully…The magazine reported she took a fatal dose of barbiturates.”

    Apparently it takes longer going that route (although unconsciousness seems to come quickly), but so what? He’s been on death row for years, what’s waiting a few hours for him to quit breathing.

    Veterinarians put down pets in relatively short order, and I am sorry to say I’ve witnessed more of these than I ever wanted to, but none of the poor creatures ever seemed to suffer. They lost consciousness, then they stopped breathing and their hearts stopped. Quickly.

    Left to me, I go back to hanging (but air bolts are a good idea as well), but the argument that lethal injects are somehow cruel and unusual is not a good-faith argument, it’s just another attempt to put stumbling blocks in the way of capital punishment.

    Eric (0ebc49)

  41. 36.The argument for the the death penalty is self refuting:
    X ended the life of Y prematurely through violence. That is so immoral and against Life that we need to end the life of X prematurely through violence

    Self refuting?
    X purposefully, willfully, and maliciously ended the life of Y. The only thing that even approaches a just reward is for X to be forfeit of life likewise,
    or to be the “indentured servant” of X’s family for life or until X’s family sees fit to release the obligation.
    People are awarded millions of dollars for pain and suffering from some accident, what is to be the payout for the pain and suffering from a purposeful murder?
    There is none.
    Point out how terrible and severe the crime is by making the punishment severe.

    It’s not self refuting, it’s self evident.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  42. of X’s family for life or until X’s family sees fit to release the obligation
    Sorry, replace “X” with “Y” in that phrase

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  43. X ended the life of Y prematurely through violence. That is so immoral and against Life that we need to end the life of X prematurely through violence.

    Lethal injection is certainly not a violent ending to a life. And especially if you compare how the little 11-month old baby in the post lost her life versus how the offender lost his life. I would say that in recognition of the value of life, all mercy and compassion was extended to Warner in his life as he was able to live on death row for almost 20 years, receive visits from family, eat three squares a day – in spite of the utter lack of mercy and compassion he showed to Adriana both in her life and in her death.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  44. Societies cannot exist if they do not protect their members from predation by other members of society. Without regard to morality, members who engage in extreme anti-social behavior must be removed from society, otherwise society becomes an acquiescent accomplice of its own enemies, and a violator of its contract with its rule-abiding members.

    That includes peanut butter and chocolate candy manufacturers who put two-bite-sized pieces of candy in large cardboard and paper wrappers to make them look bigger. It is a terrible thing to do to people err children.

    the secular humanist nk (dbc370)

  45. @ JVW,

    I agree with Dana that supporters of capital punishment ought to at least be willing to witness the result of that public policy, in the same way that I think abortion rights supporters — especially those who support partial-birth abortion — should see the results of their advocacy.

    Absolutely. However, while those who are for capital punishment would likely be willing to witness the result of the policy, it is extremely doubtful that those suppose partial-birth abortion would do likewise. There is an inherent recoil at seeing an almost fully-formed baby, in all newness, innocence and vulnerability being killed versus watching a full-grown man who has knowingly and willfully committed a vile and reprehensible crime against humanity be likewise put to death. And put to death through far, far more merciful means that said baby in a partial-birth abortion.

    And frankly, I am fully convinced that those who would witness the partial-birth abortion would be so repelled and so filled with an unspeakable horror and disgust, that there would be a great chance that they would turn away in shame from ever having advocated such a practice. And the abortion lobby and practitioners simply cannot afford to have that happen. In contrast, those who witness the putting to death of a criminal in such a neat and sanitary fashion, would likely be less impacted. (Not to diminish the weight and gravity of such an action).

    Dana (8e74ce)

  46. 36. The argument for the the death penalty is self refuting:
    X ended the life of Y prematurely through violence. That is so immoral and against Life that we need to end the life of X prematurely through violence.

    kishnevi (a5d1b9) — 1/17/2015 @ 2:49 pm

    No, it isn’t self-refuting. But for moral codes to exist at all people have to accept the existence of God. The reason you think you see a contradiction is because you’re taking the position that there’s no authority higher than yourself to decide what is and isn’t moral. But then if I take the attitude then I too can decide I’m the supreme moral authority. It just becomes a battle between us to see who can force our own personally concocted morality on the other. Neither one more correct than the other.

    Without God there is no morality. People who’ve eliminated God keep using the word, as did the Soviets with their “socialist morality.” But everyone knew that “socialist morality” was just a group of arbitrary assertions backed up by the Red Army and the NKVD.

    By definition it’s true that you can’t legislate morality. Morals don’t come from legislation.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  47. And if there’s no God and there is no morality, then then both the rape/murder of the baby and the execution become equally acceptable.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  48. 46. …However, while those who are for capital punishment would likely be willing to witness the result of the policy, it is extremely doubtful that those suppose partial-birth abortion would do likewise. There is an inherent recoil at seeing an almost fully-formed baby, in all newness, innocence and vulnerability being killed versus watching a full-grown man who has knowingly and willfully committed a vile and reprehensible crime against humanity be likewise put to death. And put to death through far, far more merciful means that said baby in a partial-birth abortion.

    Dana (8e74ce) — 1/17/2015 @ 4:13 pm

    The difference is that when I express my support for capitol punishment I do so knowing exactly what that entails. Taking a human life. Abortion enthusiasts have to deny that fact. They call it just a lump of tissue, and hide behind all sorts of euphemisms. They have to deny it’s human.

    This is why the media barely covered the Kermit Gosnell trial. I recall certain members of the “conservative” press covered it. The rest stayed away. The gallery was empty. The last thing they wanted to do was to shine light on that butcher and what he did. But since I don’t have to lie to myself about what my support for the death penalty means I wouldn’t have the same problem.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  49. we could adopt the KGB method: walk the prisoner down the hallway, one they take on a routine basis anyway, and, somewhere en-route, w/o warning, fire a soft nosed small caliber pistol bullet into the back of their head…

    it’ll rattle around inside their skull and they’ll drop right there.

    then you haul off the garbage and clean the weapon.

    redc1c4 (4db2c8)

  50. They call it just a lump of tissue, and hide behind all sorts of euphemisms. They have to deny it’s human.

    If they really believed the lump of tissue line, they wouldn’t have any problem witnessing the procedure. As it is, they don’t even want women to view an ultrasound before the procedure. The rhetorical “Why is that that?” doesn’t even need to be asked.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  51. I’m not saying that abortion and capital punishment are equivalent, but I’m saying that they share too many things in common for me to be comfortable with either of them.

    JVW, just as long as you don’t see your opposition to the death penalty as springing forth from a good part of your heart, I can deal with and accept it.

    Mark (c160ec)

  52. we could put all the criminals on death row to w*rk locating and removing UXO’s, landmines, etc, and rendering them safe…

    natural selection & the law of averages will take care of the rest.

    redc1c4 (269d8e)

  53. Dana@37.
    Yes. Just like murder by poison.
    Steve@47.
    Actually, I very much believe in God. Why you thought my statement implies I do not bewilders me. I in fact totally agree with you that morality without God is impossible.
    And part of the reason I oppose capital punishment is that it allows the State to usurp God in deciding life and death.

    People have referred to the Bible, which calls for the death penalty in various cases of sin. But the Bible was underpinned by assumptions not valid in our society.
    –murder, etc. was not a crime, but a sin, and a major rebellion against God at that.
    –the process was directly overseen by prophets and sages with direct access to the Divine Wisdom. In those cases where they got it wrong God would adjust matters. The process was heavily weighted in the direction of producing acquittals, with the knowledge that God has other ways of punishing the guilty.
    –the punishment was a form of atonement, releasing the criminal from the spiritual effects of his sin/crime once the death penalty was carried out.
    “….therefore choose life”.

    kishnevi (a5d1b9)

  54. I like the ‘Lethal Weapon’ execution by container drop myself.

    DNF (92e3e8)

  55. Witness was better: death by grain silo.

    kishnevi (3719b7)

  56. There was also the idea that a king or government had the right to inflict the death penalty.

    Sammy Finkelman (be6791)

  57. well it’s not a gratuitously violent end, seeing as the Courts have this penchant for releasing offenders willy nilly, I find that alternative unsatisfactory,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  58. #58 narciso: Not surprised the courts do it willy-nilly – they take their cue from the actions of The Won after all.

    David Crowley (970d6c)

  59. well this precedes Obama, with our National and State Supreme Courts.

    narciso (ee1f88)

  60. You guys just don’t care about unemployment in America. Every time you execute a criminal, you’re helping put prison guards, lawyers, judges, parole officers and even policemen out of work. In this economy. You’re just plain heartless.

    The death penalty is too serious a matter to be based on philosophical principles. No human is that wise. It should be based on societal consensus because like it or not society will bear the consequences of the decision either way.

    nk (dbc370)

  61. Well, I’m thinking that societal consensus needs to be based on something, and philosophical principles that can be understood and applied is good raw material.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  62. someone’s principles will prevail, either the ‘hundred year old’ constitution, or some real foolishness,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  63. Experience and aspirations.

    nk (dbc370)

  64. 54. Actually, I very much believe in God. Why you thought my statement implies I do not bewilders me. I in fact totally agree with you that morality without God is impossible.
    And part of the reason I oppose capital punishment is that it allows the State to usurp God in deciding life and death.

    People have referred to the Bible, which calls for the death penalty in various cases of sin. But the Bible was underpinned by assumptions not valid in our society.
    –murder, etc. was not a crime, but a sin, and a major rebellion against God at that.
    –the process was directly overseen by prophets and sages with direct access to the Divine Wisdom. In those cases where they got it wrong God would adjust matters. The process was heavily weighted in the direction of producing acquittals, with the knowledge that God has other ways of punishing the guilty.
    –the punishment was a form of atonement, releasing the criminal from the spiritual effects of his sin/crime once the death penalty was carried out.
    “….therefore choose life”.
    kishnevi (a5d1b9) — 1/17/2015 @ 6:09 pm

    The state doesn’t usurp God when it executes a murderer. The ten commandments are very much laws (and the process was not overseen by prophets and sages appealing directly to divine wisdom but rabbinical courts applying Jewish laws derived from those ten commandments). Murder is not simply a question of morality and rebellion against God but a matter of law and rebellion against the very basis of society. And governments are established to defend society. When the state executes a murderer it is not usurping God anymore than when it convicts someone and imposes any other morally just and lawful punishment.

    What people don’t understand about the various “eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, life for a life” verses of the Old Testament is that they establish a legal principal that we still nominally adhere to today (but in fact have abandoned; more on that later).

    All persons are equal before the law. A slave’s eye is worth just as much as a king’s eye, and a slave’s life is worth just as much as a king’s life. This was a huge step up as this had never been true in any society before.

    Also, except for the “life for a life” part it was never meant to be taken literally. How do I know this? Because you’ll never find an example of anyone sentenced to having their eye gouged out in retaliation in the Bible. That sort of maiming was never a punishment under Jewish law. There’s a reason for that. Back in the day with no medical facilities or antibiotics if you maimed somebody by gouging out an eye you could easily kill them. That’s why Exodus 21 makes it clear that “the one who struck the blow” would be liable for murder if the person he wounded died from his wound. But if the person recovered then the perp wouldn’t have his eye gouged out because then the perp, too, could die. And the authorities would have gone too far and acted unlawfully. So the punishment was always monetary compensation. And the fine had to hurt as much as it was possible as the person who had lost his eye had been hurt. At some level that eye should be worth an eye, but no more.

    But if the victim died of his wounds then there was no danger of the authorities hurting the perp more than the perp had hurt his victim. So then it was a life for a life. The killer loses the right to their life.

    The problem with your idea of life imprisonment in solitary confinement is that it only exists in theory. In reality as long as the person is alive they can possibly get out and resume their lives. And the worst recent example is when the Obama administration released two Cuban spies who were directly responsible for the murders of American citizens. The families of the murdered men had to watch as they got of the plane, healthy if slightly overweight from good American prison food, to a hero’s welcome in Havana.

    Not all lives are worth as much anymore. We see this in Europe. Again. Jews in Paris and Malmo are fleeing because governments don’t value their lives as much as appeasing Muslims. Even in the UK half of British Jews don’t believe they have a future there. Societies literally fall apart when governments depart the principal that everyone is equal before the law. And instead decide that for whatever reasons certain lives just aren’t worth that much. The life for a life principle is the basis of society. When governments abandon it then society suffers and begins to crumble. Executions defend society. They have nothing to do with atonement, and never have. That’s entirely up to God as it always was.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  65. Mr. 57 is a prime candidate for contributing associate along side Ms. Dana, IMO, provided a foil is not an absolute inspirational necessity.

    DNF (92e3e8)

  66. I should probably point out that the “eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, life for a life” verses of the Old Testament don’t just establish one single legal principle. I.E. that everyone is equal before the law. But others as well, which I mentioned but I didn’t place much emphasis on.

    …And the fine had to hurt as much as it was possible as the person who had lost his eye had been hurt. At some level that eye should be worth an eye, but no more….

    It placed limits on the punishment you could mete out to someone for their crimes.

    Which is relevant to the discussion, too, because it informs where I stand on capital punishment. While a convicted murderer loses the right to his life, the state doesn’t necessarily have to take it. I’m not opposed to life imprisonment without possibility of parole. I’m not even opposed to a life sentence with the possibility of parole. The punishment must fit the crime.

    But by the same principle the death sentence is the only punishment that fits the crime. Unrepentant, remorseless killers aren’t fit even to be in prison. Many of these murderers kill again while in prison. A guard deserves to be protected from them. So do other prisoners. Per the principle of an eye for an eye, someone convicted of grand theft can not be sentenced to more than the maximum. So if that’s a 20 year sentence, the state can’t give them death. Which, like gouging out an eye, could very well be the result if you put an unrepentant murderer in as their cellmate or even in population.

    Individual mad dogs fall into this category. I’d say that would include Anders Breivik. As you recall he killed 77 people in Oslo back in 2011. He only got 21 years, which is the ridiculous maximum sentence in Norway, and he sits in prison practically taunting Norwegians. He’s bringing all kinds of nuisance complaints against the government, such as the prison won’t let him have the latest Gameboy!?!?! I understand his sentence can be extended, and it’s likely he’ll never be released. Justice demands that it be certain he never be released.

    Those Cuban spies should never have been released. The only way to ensure that no future President pardoned them for ideological reasons would have been to execute them. The same goes for those unrepentant FALN terrorists who Clinton pardoned on the recommendation of the despicable Eric Holder. It is immoral for this or any other administration to lean on Israel to release unrepentant Palestinian terrorists. But then, the Israelis need to have and use the death sentence on them.

    The way it is now those guys know they’re only one round of peace negotiations or one kidnapped Israeli away from getting released so they can kill again. In theory only are they sentenced to life in prison, and they know it. It’s perfectly likely they’ll get their hero’s welcome rather than die in prison.

    I obviously support the death penalty. It must always be available. But there are very, very few cases where it should be applied. But had the French caught the Charlie Hebdo murderers instead of killing them in a gunfight that would have been one such case.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  67. DNF, if nominated I will not run.

    I appreciate the thought, though. But for a variety of reasons I’d just like to remain a rank and file commenter.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  68. Israel was chosen for all time as His special treasure to manifest His Holy character and Sovereign nature among the nations.

    They are holy because He is Holy and they are to expunge evil from their midst.

    DNF (92e3e8)

  69. 68. Very well.

    DNF (92e3e8)

  70. Mr 57 wrote:

    I obviously support the death penalty. It must always be available. But there are very, very few cases where it should be applied. But had the French caught the Charlie Hebdo murderers instead of killing them in a gunfight that would have been one such case.

    And it would be one case that would never have led to execution. The French no longer have capital punishment, but, even if they did, this would have been the last case on which they would use it, to avoid offending the Muslims.

    The Francophile Dana (1b79fa)

  71. Dana @71, agreed on all counts.

    That’s why Jews in France and elsewhere in Europe are looking to get out. They know they live in societies that craven governments are afraid to defend. As they are afraid to defend Jewish lives.

    The governments of Europe, and now our own unfortunately, have sent a very clear signal to the Muslims that they have and continue to invite in. Western principles such as free speech as well as Jewish lives are too much trouble to defend. That would require moral courage, the courage of convictions. Those are qualities Western governing elites just don’t have.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  72. Not all lives are worth as much anymore. We see this in Europe.

    I’m always wary of how human life (my own included) will be treated when the people in charge — in the government, via city hall, the judicial system, the police department — are poor judges of the good and bad in both humans and situations. While conservatives may err in that category on occasion, liberals are much, much worse. They’re notorious for shedding tears for ruthless criminals and, in turn, allowing a community or society to go straight down the toilet. They’re like the Obamas of the world, who weep for the Michael Browns or the Trayvon Martins while being “c’est la vie” towards the victims of such troublemakers.

    When I think of the high rates of criminality in liberal citadels of the US and in socialist paradises like Venezuela or Argentina, I feel sorry for victims of crime caught within those places—although if such people are reliable supporters of liberalism and liberals, they need to shoulder a good part of the blame.

    And, again, the big irony is that people of the left perceive themselves and their ideology as being infused with humaneness and compassion.

    Mark (c160ec)

  73. While I struggle with the imponderables in my calculations the era of the ‘Nations’ should be wrapped up by 2032 at the outside, FWIW.

    Word to the wise, get your affairs in order.

    DNF (92e3e8)

  74. Would not releasing this dude into the general population have resulted in his death faster?

    Michael Ejercito (45f52b)

  75. Further to the Francophile Dana, it’s the very cases that require the death penalty but don’t receive it that demonstrate why it’s vital to retain.

    Murder is, as I said, not only rebellion against God but rebellion against the very basis of society. Free speech is one of those bases.

    But what would you expect of France, where entire Banlieues of French cities are Muslim-only, no go zones where the police fear to tread? French law doesn’t apply in those Banlieues, Sharia law does. And French authorities are afraid to do anything about it. The Charlie Hebdo killers got the message, and they enforced Sharia laws against insulting the prophet outside their stronghold. Everyone in France now knows (or should know) there is no place outside the reach of Sharia law, but there are places in France outside the reach of French law.

    I’m not suggesting that the French should have used the death penalty to gain control of those Sharia law, no go zones. Had they acted earlier to crack down on them the Charlie Hebdo killers probably would have never become this radicalized in the first place. They wouldn’t have learned that terror and intimidation works in France. If the French want to turn the situation around now, the death penalty needs to be one of the tools in the shed.

    It isn’t, though, because like free speech they forgot why they needed it.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  76. 75. Would not releasing this dude into the general population have resulted in his death faster?

    Michael Ejercito (45f52b) — 1/18/2015 @ 8:50 am

    That’s not the way it works now. In reality it’s the prisoners who aren’t the stone cold killers who get killed by those who are.

    Now, we could turn control of the prisons to the prisoners and make them all into stone cold killers, but then those new stone cold killers will be getting out some day.

    For practical as well as moral reasons I suggest that’s not the way to go. We need to enforce the law inside of prison just like the French need to (but don’t) enforce the law in their banlieues. And hammer home the message hard that you have to obey the law inside as well as outside of prison.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  77. Mr 57 wrote:

    I’m not suggesting that the French should have used the death penalty to gain control of those Sharia law, no go zones. Had they acted earlier to crack down on them the Charlie Hebdo killers probably would have never become this radicalized in the first place. They wouldn’t have learned that terror and intimidation works in France. If the French want to turn the situation around now, the death penalty needs to be one of the tools in the shed.

    The death penalty is of no deterrent at all to those who consciously choose martyrdom. The Hebdo terrorists expected to die all along. If they had been trying to survive, the attack wouldn’t have been personal, but by a bomb or some other mechanism of death which didn’t expose them to danger.

    To have prevented the radicalization, France would have to outlaw Islam and Muslim education, period, and probably have to have somehow censored the internet as well.

    The coldly realistic Dana (1b79fa)

  78. 76. They were arrested, they became Islamicized in prison, they were prosecuted, they were released, they were watched…

    But there probably were spies in the French government (corruption) that told them last summer they were off the watch list.

    And also – this thing was, at least in part, a false flag operation.

    Amedy Coulibaly understood he was working for ISIS. He had contacts with the people in Belgium, whose focus was attacking police *, and that’s where the weapons came from – and he supplied them to the Kouachi brothers….

    …who, at least, thought they were being directed by Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula – which they called “AL Qaeda in Yemen.”

    Coulibaly said he gave them the money they needed to finish (they had gotten money from AQAP in 2011)

    * That’s why he switched targets to a policewoman when the opportunity suddenly came up when he ran into a car accident site. It is thought his original target was a Jewish school and synagigue in Montrouge, about 100 meters from where he shot the ppolicewoman (Was he parked there wating for the right moment? Is it that he may not have known what he would encounter when he got there, and so may have been worried that he might be killed by armed guards?)

    He also shot a jogger on Wednesday, the first day of the terror spree, for some reason. Shell casings were matched to the weapon he used at the kosher market on Friday.

    Sammy Finkelman (be6791)

  79. you know who can lynch a black man cleanly and efficiently?

    NPR

    just ask Bill Cosby

    happyfeet (831175)

  80. Dana, humiliating perp walks (especially under the thumb of the filthy kufar) and when necessary a few hangings earlier on would have made the idea of martyrdom a lot less attractive.

    The home-grown radicalized Muslim threat is entirely a creation of fear-based Western policies toward the Muslims who live in their societies.

    But then Western governments cower in the corner at the thought of being called Islamophobes. Contrast that to the UAE’s listing of CAIR as a terror group and al-Sissi’s speech. They can wake up to what they’re dealing and crack down on it because they’re not worried about what names western leftists are going to call them.

    I guarantee you that if you look at the measure they take that will make martyrdom unattractive they will be along the lines of what you’re saying can’t work.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  81. The UAE and al-Sissi don’t have a problem with being accused of religious persecution, or not according proper honor to clerics..

    Sammy Finkelman (be6791)

  82. .

    But what would you expect of France, where entire Banlieues of French cities are Muslim-only, no go zones where the police fear to tread? French law doesn’t apply in those Banlieues, Sharia law does. And French authorities are afraid to do anything about it. The Charlie Hebdo killers got the message, and they enforced Sharia laws against insulting the prophet outside their stronghold. Everyone in France now knows (or should know) there is no place outside the reach of Sharia law, but there are places in France outside the reach of French law.

    this is an outrage.

    What France needs is for its military to overthrow the government and install a military dictatorship that will enforce French national values, complete with public execution of anyone who dares disagrees with those values. that is the only way to save the country.

    Michael Ejercito (45f52b)

  83. 83. …What France needs is for its military to overthrow the government and install a military dictatorship that will enforce French national values, complete with public execution of anyone who dares disagrees with those values. that is the only way to save the country.

    Michael Ejercito (45f52b) — 1/18/2015 @ 10:04 am

    They’re not there yet, but hold that thought. That will be the only answer if the French keep taking their own advice, like Prom Queen insisted Egypt take his.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  84. 83. Didn’t that happen in 1958? (except for the public execution part and so on)

    Sammy Finkelman (be6791)

  85. …enforce French national values, complete with public execution of anyone who dares disagrees with those values…

    Of course, Michael E. That’s exactly what I was talking about. Executing people like the Kouachi brothers who merely dared to disagree with Western values.

    Bury your head in the sand much?

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  86. Of course, Michael E. That’s exactly what I was talking about. Executing people like the Kouachi brothers who merely dared to disagree with Western values.

    Bury your head in the sand much?

    It is better than the altyernative.

    why should not France use the force of law to enforce its values?

    Michael Ejercito (45f52b)

  87. You’re right, Mike. It’s just wrong to enforce values that say you can’t use violence to make your point. It’s just wrong to say intentionally murdering someone over their exercise of free speech is anything but “disagreement.”

    Also, there’s absolutely not reason to believe one set of values is better than another set of values. So there can be only one reason I say the Western values of the enlightenment that produced the technical achievements of the twentieth century possible to the Islamic values that make the 7th century possible. The values of one society that produced hundreds of winners of Nobel prizes in science as opposed to the values of another society that produced none (at least none doing their work in that society; if we include those who escaped there are two).

    My racisty racism against the Muslim race.

    Besides, we stole their oil. That’s why the Saudi and Gulf royals ares so dirt poor.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  88. Thanks for calling me on everything, Mr. Ejercito.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  89. Mr. Badaoui — who is himself Muslim — said he could not remember their ever praying….“If they had a religion,” he said, “it was Paris.”

    …“Chérif Kouachi did not consider himself to be a good Muslim,” wrote Paris prosecutors in a final report after his 2005 arrest. “He indicated he had started going to the mosque two to three years earlier and had started progressively praying more, even though he still smoked marijuana.”

    Self-taught, Mr. Benyettou began offering lessons to a group of young men, later called the Buttes-Chaumont group for a neighborhood park, everyone seated on the carpeted floor of the mosque almost daily for two hours.

    The classes kept Chérif on the straight and narrow — when he was attending them, the prosecutor wrote — and he no longer drank or smoked. When he stopped going, he immediately went back to his old habits.

    Charismatic and self-assured, Mr. Benyettou incited young men to join jihad…

    …By September and October 2004, court transcripts show, Chérif and Saïd began going regularly to Mr. Benyettou’s apartment to discuss the religious justification for suicide attacks. There, they talked about how to load a bomb into a truck and drive it into an American base.

    It was Chérif who began clamoring to stage an attack in France, a plot that not even his spiritual mentor approved.

    “Chérif never stopped talking about the Jewish shops, of attacking them in the street in order to kill them,” said his friend and co-conspirator Thamer Bouchnak during his deposition. “He talked obsessively about this — about doing something here in France.”

    “He asked Farid Benyettou if it was allowed,” Mr. Bouchnak added. “He wanted to have permission from the person who had taught him. Farid didn’t give his permission.”

    They were “born-again” Muslims.

    Sammy Finkelman (be6791)

  90. Deterrence, you see.

    Sammy Finkelman (be6791)

  91. just ask Bill Cosby

    Or Clarence Thomas

    Kevin M (25bbee)

  92. why should not France use the force of law to enforce its values?

    Since the left has done that throughout Europe, and since things are getting worse and worse, such a comment should not be characterized as tongue-in-cheek. After all, right here in the good ol’ US, various sectors of the government (eg, human rights commissions, or make that “human rights” commissions) are forcing businesses to bend not just to the quirks of customers’ overtly intrinsic, innate qualities — real or imagined — but to the behavior of such people itself.

    Moreover, there have been cases where not only customers but employees of companies have sued to be accommodated, to be allowed to, for example, wear tongue studs or pierced nose rings, or a head scarf (a matter involving an Islamic woman working at Disneyland a few years ago) and gotten away with the crud of self-entitlement going off the deep end.

    The phrase of “this will not end well” does haunt me.

    Mark (c160ec)

  93. An initial dosage of 185gr. of .45JHP, applied at the base of the cranium, is always….always….always effective!

    askeptic (efcf22)

  94. Mr Ejercito asked:

    why should not France use the force of law to enforce its values?

    And what values would those be? Freedom of Speech? Nope, not really. Freedom of Religion? Not there, either. Right to keep and bear arms? Surely you jest!

    French “values” include trashing the entire morality and ethics of human society, developed over thousands of years, anti-Semitism, a destroyed work ethic, abortion and same-sex “marriage.” The Islamists do have one point: what is there that’s worth saving?

    The Dana asking the obvious question (1b79fa)

  95. +1 Dana.

    Just one quibble.

    …French “values” include trashing the entire morality and ethics of human society civilization

    I know, I know. That’s Islamophic of me to say that. No doubt I offended the prophet. I should not be allowed to say things that offend the prophet. That is not what our values are. I should not be allowed to say that Muslims who murder to over speech that offends their sensibilities (an act of terror designed to shut everyone up if people say what they don’t like) should get the death penalty for what is an especially heinous murder. It’s a good murder, no doubt. After all, our beloved Preezy has said that the future can not belong to those who offend the prophet. I am not in compliance with these new Western values. Which ironically are Islamic values. Perhaps I should be deported to Saudi Arabia to experience the joys of Islamic civilization.

    You know, the country that will sentence you to death for a tweet or sentence bloggers to 1,000 lashes and 10 years in prison for anything that offends the prophet.

    http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/01/15/saudi-blogger-raif-badawi-set-to-receive-second-round-lashes-after-islam/

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  96. Apparently Muslims who “disagree” with what used to be our values with AK-47s are President Mean Girl’s newest allies in his campaign to fundamentally transform the US.

    Which after all has no redeeming qualities. Certainly no founding principles worth defending.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  97. What is worth saving?
    French cooking, French wine, and the Musee d’Orsai.
    Although one doesn’t actually need France itself to preserve the first and the third.
    But the idea that the land in which the cult of the vine reached apogee should come under the Quran is…sacre bleu!

    kishnevi (294553)

  98. Houllebecq, who is sort of a more talented Russell Brand in some ways, in his novel, ‘Submission’ chooses not to defend French culture,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  99. More talented Russell Brand…

    That is setting the bar pretty low,you know.

    kishnevi (3719b7)

  100. I may have been too harsh:

    http://www.steynonline.com/6749/the-trouser-press

    narciso (ee1f88)

  101. Michael, your earlier comment was so ridiculous and obtuse I had to go back to it once more.

    83.

    But what would you expect of France, where entire Banlieues of French cities are Muslim-only, no go zones where the police fear to tread? French law doesn’t apply in those Banlieues, Sharia law does. And French authorities are afraid to do anything about it. The Charlie Hebdo killers got the message, and they enforced Sharia laws against insulting the prophet outside their stronghold. Everyone in France now knows (or should know) there is no place outside the reach of Sharia law, but there are places in France outside the reach of French law.

    this is an outrage.

    It is an outrage. Name one thing on that list that isn’t.

    What France needs is for its military to overthrow the government and install a military dictatorship that will enforce French national values, complete with public execution of anyone who dares disagrees with those values. that is the only way to save the country.
    Michael Ejercito (45f52b) — 1/18/2015 @ 10:04 am

    At this point the only value at stake is France’s existence. Why shouldn’t the French enforce that, complete with public executions if they choose of anyone that “disagrees” with that value through violent, murderous rebellion? And that is the only way to save the country. Violently destroy those who are trying to destroy you.

    http://www.steynonline.com/6750/exodus

    …Over the last decade, the Continent seems to have developed a certain psychological ease with the routine murder of Jews. What remains of Jewish communal life in Europe now takes place behind reinforced doors and barbed wire, and the actual extinction of an entire identity group’s presence is discussed as calmly as the long-range weather.

    …The Jews are always the canaries in the coal mine, so they won’t be the last in Europe to discover that, when it matters, the state isn’t there for you. There is a memorable moment in Michel Houellebecq’s new novel Soumission, released the day of the Charlie Hebdo slaughter, in which the protagonist’s Jewish girlfriend Myriam decides it’s time to get the hell out of France and flee to Israel. And François says bleakly, “There is no Israel for me.”

    …Here’s what I wrote on the subject just under three years ago:

    …No, wait, forget the Villiers-le-Bel schoolgirl brutally beaten by a gang jeering, “Jews must die”; and the Paris disc-jockey who had his throat slit, his eyes gouged out, and his face ripped off by a neighbor who crowed, “I have killed my Jew”; and the young Frenchman tortured to death over three weeks, while his family listened via phone to his howls of agony as his captors chanted from the Koran… No, put all that to one side, too, and consider only the city of Toulouse. In recent years, in this one city, a synagogue has been firebombed, another set alight when two burning cars were driven into it, a third burgled and “Dirty Jews” scrawled on the ark housing the Torah, a kosher butcher’s strafed with gunfire, a Jewish sports association attacked with Molotov cocktails…

    …Well, you say, why are those Jewish kids going to a Jewish school? Why don’t they go to the regular French school like normal French kids? Because, as the education ministry’s admirably straightforward 2004 Obin Report explained, “En France les enfants juifs — et ils sont les seuls dans ce cas — ne peuvent plus de nos jours être scolarisés dans n’importe quel établissement”: “In France, Jewish children, uniquely, cannot nowadays be provided with an education at any institution.” At some schools, they’re separated from the rest of the class. At others, only the principal is informed of their Jewishness, and he assures parents he will be discreet and vigilant. But, as the report’s authors note, “le patronyme des élèves ne le permet pas toujours”: “The pupil’s surname does not always allow” for such “discretion.”

    …”Jews with a conscience should leave Holland, where they and their children have no future, leave for the U.S. or Israel,” advised Frits Bolkestein, the former EU commissioner and head of the Dutch Liberal party. “Anti-Semitism will continue to exist, because the Moroccan and Turkish youngsters don’t care about efforts for reconciliation…”

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  102. And it isn’t just France. It’s all of Europe.

    http://10news.dk/sweden-muslim-rapes-woman-lying-on-broken-glass/

    In another Swedish rape case that took place inside a Muslim ghetto, a female was gang raped; raped until bleeding with a gun; gang raped again. The risk of being raped in Sweden during one’s lifetime is one out of four (including estimated shadow-figures and if every raped woman is only raped once), which is probably equal to the risk of being raped in countries in war, such as Iraq or Syria. When it comes to rape, Islamized Sweden is already in a state of war. Sweden does not publish statistics on immigrant crime. If we want to have a hint about who is committing these tens of thousands rapes and other types of sexual assaults yearly, we can turn to another Scandinavian country, Sweden’s neighbor Norway, the country most similar to Sweden. Here 100 percent of all attack-rapes (rapes where the attacker and the victim did not know each other beforehand) in the last five years in Oslo were committed by immigrants from “non-Western” countries.

    The very violent rape took place September 12, 2014. It all began when the Somali man stole the woman’s bicycle. When she followed him to take back the bike, he trapped her in a courtyard.

    …‘The woman has felt the fear of death, and many times during the rapes she asked him to stop, at one point by resting on knees with her hands clasped. The man … held the woman in a way so she could not breathe. She has been lying on broken glass and he attempted anal intercourse,’ reads the judgment.

    Sweden, as noted above, doesn’t publish immigrant crime statistics. So I am positive many of these rapes go unsolved since they take place in the no-go areas of Stockholm or Malmo. The police can’t solve these crimes if they’re afraid of going to the crime scene. Too hard. No, the real crime in Sweden is talking about it. Because that’s a crime the Swedish police aren’t afraid to investigate.

    I know it’s Islamophobic to say this, but the reason all these rapes are being committed is because Muslim men are taught Western women who walk around without head scarves are whores. And Imams are open about preaching that such women are asking to be raped. One side sees this as a war of conquest, and rape has always been a part of wars of conquest. But in Islamic wars of conquest rape is on in massive numbers and is systematically organized. The Quran and the Sunnah literature is replete with justifications for rape.

    It’s why Boko Haram can abduct hundreds of girls and sell them on the slave markets. It’s why ISIS not only does that to Yezidi girls and other non-Sunnis, but they can actually publish a pamphlet citing chapter and verse of why it’s lawful for them to do it and tell their members how their sex slave markets are to be run. A theologically correct pamphlet I might add. And they are emulating their prophet, which Muslims are commanded to do since Muhammad was the most perfect man who ever live.

    It’s why devout Muslims dress and grow beards to look like their prophet.

    Getting back to the point of the thread, the Muslims demanded a new right in Europe. Freedom of Aggression. And the Europeans granted them that right. And when they did they condemned citizens of the native ethnicity to second class status. Swedish girls are lesser beings than Muslim girls.

    All lives are no longer equal under the law anymore.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  103. ISIS intends on killing hundreds of millions, undoubtedly Muslims and Westerners.

    The last words on that Indonesian cockpit recorder–“Allahu Akbar”.

    DNF (831ee5)

  104. Steve57 (2baf2d) — 1/19/2015 @ 1:23 am

    … the reason all these rapes are being committed is because Muslim men are taught Western women who walk around without head scarves are whores. And Imams are open about preaching that such women are asking to be raped.

    Maybe because the father or brother of a Moslem women he rapes, especially of she knows who he is, might kill him?

    So men of Scandinavian background rape women they know (and don’t touch Moslems) but Moslems rape only women they don’t know. WHo also maybe won’t mind it so much, they think, since they’ve probably had sex before with multiple partners.

    Sammy Finkelman (e806a6)

  105. DNF (831ee5) — 1/19/2015 @ 7:12 am

    The last words on that Indonesian cockpit recorder–”Allahu Akbar”.

    Is that something Moslems, in Indonesia at least, are encouraged to say before they die?

    Sammy Finkelman (e806a6)

  106. You know now that you mention ISIS, DNF, it’s deja vu all over again with this administration. Flashback to 2010 and recall when Hillary! and an Army General made the classic political Freudian slips and accidentally told the truth about what’s going on in Mexico? They called the cartels an insurgency. Both the Mexican and USGs immediately denied that it was an insurgency, and Hillary! and the General were contrite in their retractions after their spankings.

    http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/sep/09/hillary-clinton-mexican-drug-war-insurgency

    Of course they f’d up. Because that’s exactly what it is. If it were officially declared an insurgency the USG would have to take actions to defend the country since it’s right on our border. Defending this country is the last thing Prom Queen wants to do. What did the SCOAMF do? Well, he ran guns to them. He armed them. And he partnered with them in there human smuggling activities. A judge in El Paso issued a very rare type of writ in which he noted that this government has completed criminal transactions initiated by illegal aliens in this country, in partnership with human smugglers, by essentially taking the hand-off at the border and flying the kids to their parents. The Judge found that appalling. He was right. But it got worse. Later tens of thousands of kids came across the border. A border controlled entirely by the cartels, and their is no way that could have been done without coordinating with the cartels.

    Fast forward to today. Obama and the rest of the PC crowd are insisting, for instance, that the terrorist assault on Charlie Hebdo violated all the principles of love and tolerance of Islam, so STFU and don’t you dare call it Islamic. Oddly, the Euroweenies were calling it Islamic. But Obama refuses to say the “I” word and has vowed to fight the LHMFM if it does.

    But let’s examine if killing people who offend the prophet is “unislamic” by consulting the original Islamic sources.

    Ibn Ishaq was one of if not the earliest biographaers of Muhammad and still considered reliable. On page 675 of a very reliable translation of The Prophet of God published by Oxford University Press (no link, google it yourself) he details how an elderly Jew reputed to be over 100y.o. named Abu Afak was upset that Muhammad’s men had killed another man because he objected to Muhammad having his father executed. Abu Afak in turn disliked the fact that Muhammad had the guy’s son killed. So Abu Afak wrote a poem lampooning the prophet. Muhammad was offended, so he ordered one of his men to kill the old man. And one of his henchmen did so. Muslims will now dispute the accuracy of this tale for no other reason than they don’t like it. But what they can not dispute is their own Sunnah (hence the name Sunni, they adhere to the Sunnah). Sunan Abu Dawud is one of the most respected compilers of Ahadith in Islam, second only to the two Sahihs. The first two passages note that during Muhammad’s lifetime he approved when people took the initiative and killed people who insulted him. He could have take the opportunity to say “No, that’s unislamic” and punished them. But he didn’t. In fact he forbade anyone to punish them for killing these people:

    http://www.sunnah.com/abudawud/40

    40. Prescribed Punishments (Kitab Al-Hudud)

    (2) Chapter: The ruling regarding one who reviles the prophet (pbuh)

    Narrated Abdullah Ibn Abbas:

    A blind man had a slave-mother who used to abuse the Prophet (ﷺ) and disparage him. He forbade her but she did not stop. He rebuked her but she did not give up her habit. One night she began to slander the Prophet (ﷺ) and abuse him. So he took a dagger, placed it on her belly, pressed it, and killed her. A child who came between her legs was smeared with the blood that was there. When the morning came, the Prophet (ﷺ) was informed about it.

    He assembled the people and said: I adjure by Allah the man who has done this action and I adjure him by my right to him that he should stand up. Jumping over the necks of the people and trembling the man stood up.

    He sat before the Prophet (ﷺ) and said: Messenger of Allah! I am her master; she used to abuse you and disparage you. I forbade her, but she did not stop, and I rebuked her, but she did not abandon her habit. I have two sons like pearls from her, and she was my companion. Last night she began to abuse and disparage you. So I took a dagger, put it on her belly and pressed it till I killed her.

    Thereupon the Prophet (ﷺ) said: Oh be witness, no retaliation is payable for her blood.

    Grade : Sahih (Al-Albani)
    Reference : Sunan Abi Dawud 4361

    A Jewess used to abuse the Prophet (ﷺ) and disparage him. A man strangled her till she died. The Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) declared that no recompense was payable for her blood.

    Grade : Da’if in chain (Al-Albani)
    Reference : Sunan Abi Dawud 4362

    Here’s where it gets tricky. It may at first appear that Muslims can no longer kill someone for offending the prophet. But that’s only a veneer.

    AbuBarzah said: I was with AbuBakr. He became angry at a man and uttered hot words. I said: Do you permit me, Caliph of the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ), that I cut off his neck? These words of mine removed his anger; he stood and went in. He then sent for me and said: What did you say just now? I said: (I had said:) Permit me that I cut off his neck. He said: Would you do it if I ordered you? I said: Yes. He said: No, I swear by Allah, this is not allowed for any man after Muhammad (ﷺ).

    Abu Dawud said: This is Yazid’s version. Ahmad bin Hanbal said: That is, Abu Bakr has no powers to slay a man except for three reasons which the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) had mentioned: disbelief after belief, fornication after marriage, or killing a man without (murdering) any man by him. The Prophet (ﷺ) had powers to kill.

    Grade : Sahih (Al-Albani)
    Reference : Sunan Abi Dawud 4363

    Sahih means authentic. It is taken as Gospel by Muslims, and is considered to be basically on par with the Quran itself (Da’if means weak, but it isn’t a fabrication).

    Note that here we have the first Caliph admitting his order not to kill a man for insulting the prophet represents a change in policy. While the prophet ordered it done, in Abu Bakr’s view he didn’t have the same authority. Only the prophet had the power to order someone killed for anything other than the three reasons spelled out in the Quran.

    The key to understanding what’s going on is that the Caliph’s order essentially has the same weight as a Presidential Executive Order. None of the succeeding Caliphs would be bound by it.

    So if someone were to swear allegiance to ISIS as their Caliph, it would be legit if they followed the exact example of Muhammad in word and deed. The same if someone were to swear allegiance to the emir of AQ.

    In the Quran, Allah orders Muslims to obey him, Muhammad, and their Caliph. Not one a thousand years ago. The one now. Sometimes the Quran uses a different word instead of Caliph; Imam. Which starts letting me circle back toward the point where I started.

    One of Iran’s senior Imam’s made international headlines last February when he reminded everyone that the Fatwa ordering the killing of Salman Rushdie for offending the prophet and Allah is as “fresh as ever.”

    You don’t hear Obama calling the Iranians “unislamic” for ordering the exact same thing that was just done in Paris, do you? In fact, he can’t help himself. He refers to it respectfully as the “Islamic Republic” every chance he gets. And I’d say that’s what behind his refusal to say the “I” word no matter how stupid he looks in the interim. He desperately wants a deal with Iran, and it’s very clear that he wants a deal in which Iran gets everything it wants including nukes, while we get (maybe) a WaPo reporter back.

    Even though the reporter belongs to the WaPo, the WaPo editorial board can’t understand the logic of Obama threatening to veto the one thing thing that can give him leverage in his negotiations with the Iranians. Sanctions. Congress would pass a sanctions bill that wouldn’t kick in until after the deadline. If he talks fail, and Obama is running around saying they will (less than 50/50) yet the one thing that would improve the odds of forcing Iran to come to the table willing to compromise and avoid that failure is the one thing he doesn’t want.

    This jihad he’s declared against anyone using the “I” word reminds me of his knocking anyone’s head off if they used the other “I” word, insurgency, when talking about the Mexican cartels. And the reason back then was because they were tacit allies.

    It’s the same reason now. He’s not working for us. He’s their American agent.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  107. It’s hard for me to imagine that Obola would condescend to be anyone’s “agent”. He can stop the rise of oceans and perform other miracles. He has a gift, as he’s only to willing to tell us. Is there a place in the islamic constellation for a Grand Imam, the Caliph of Caliphs?

    bobathome (f208b6)

  108. Why’s that so hard for you to imagine, bobathome? He’s President Valerie Jarrett’s agent. And she’s the one who was born in Iran and keeps heading over there for secret talks.

    Steve57 (2baf2d)

  109. As taxpayers who demand the efficient administration of existing law — which, in states like Texas and Oklahoma, includes the regular and fully due-processed administration of the death penalty after all appropriate direct and collateral appeals have been exhausted — we ought insist that proceedings like this one be competently and efficiently conducted, without spectacle, but with efficiency and dignity appropriate to the circumstances. Those are unique: the state-directed extinction of a human life, pursuant to the Rule of Law. There’s no room for screw-ups or levity.

    But neither is their room for spectacle. Nor is there room for fantasy.

    People who fantasize about the excruciating pain and torment of the convicted capital defendant as the lethal injection does its work are engaging in fantasy.

    If only because they lack dignity appropriate to the circumstances, those people aren’t worth our serious attention.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  110. Beldar,

    Do you think there was no societal benefit to historical public executions in so much as a deterrent and/or a much more realistic understanding of the severity of the punishment?

    Dana (8e74ce)

  111. And while I’m telling kids to get off my lawn:

    Hey you kids, you BigPharm execs who, on self-righteous “ethical” grounds, won’t let your companies sell the time-tested reliable drugs to the People of the State of ____, whose legislatures and courts, subject to SCOTUS overrule, have determined that particular human beings be put to death by lethal injection:

    Keep this up, and we’ll start looking at the science and technology in real close detail.

    We’ll start looking at things like nerve conduction times, and how long it takes before consciousness can actually appreciate its obliteration.

    It’s the poor engineer who couldn’t update Messr. Guillotine’s design. No drugs, nor even physicians or medical technicians, required. The end result would be more reliable and, it can be very persuasively argued from the science, less physically painful.

    The reason we don’t still use the guillotine is not that it was ineffective or cruel. The reason we use it is because there is a component of terror associated with beheadings that is missing when a person is, instead, simply injected with a sedating drug, then a paralyzing drug and a life-extinguishing drug.

    The deaths aren’t that different. But the contemplation of the deaths — and the public reaction thereto — are very different. Society is sending a message through its implementation of capital punishment on a rational and legal basis, but the message doesn’t depend on terror.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  112. Somebody who should know tells me that there’s backlash to the brain from severing the spinal cord at the third vertebra and higher causing immediate unconsciousness.

    nk (dbc370)

  113. Dana: I think that’s an excellent question. I end up coming down in favor of absolute transparency without any spectacle.

    Put another way: I approve of the way the death penalty is currently administered in Texas. By “administered,” I include not just the execution of sentence, but the entire criminal justice process from trial through conviction through direct appeal through collateral (mostly federal habeas) attack.

    I don’t think anyone in Texas much doubts that if you commit a capital crime, you’re at a very real and serious risk that upon conviction, you’re actually going to get the needle, and it will indeed work. I fully appreciate, and applaud, the efforts of the criminal defense bar, but also of their opponents — the prosecutors and the assistant state attorneys general who handle post-conviction work — and the very experienced courts, state and federal, through whom those convictions and sentences proceed.

    In Texas, executions are “public” in every important sense: There are adequate, and more than adequate, opportunities for the public, concerned citizens, and anyone else to sniff and scratch and, in enough instances, view the process. There’s adequate sunlight for the process to be fully disinfected, in other words.

    But would I support having executions televised? No. I’d not, because the public reaction would confer more dignity on the capital murderers than they deserve at the moment society exacts lawful retribution of them for their crimes.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  114. That would be with a properly conducted hanging or well-placed shot from a small pistol as well as a blade.

    nk (dbc370)

  115. I apologize for the string posts but here’s another angle that might illuminate my views:

    When one commits a capital crime for which a jury of one’s peers, in conformity with the rule of law, has found that the appropriate sentence is death, then one has forfeited his life.

    One ought not gain — by that forfeiture of one’s most precious and defining thing — a chance to show off.

    Nor ought the State show off — press emotional atavistic buttons — in completing that process.

    A convicted capital murderer deserves, from the State, complete and due process; reasonable dignity; and extinction.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  116. nk: Could be, yes. I personally like the lethal injection because it’s what we do to mad dogs.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  117. In considering it, I think that at one point in time in our history, executions in the public square did not produce a sympathy in the witnesses for the offender, but rather a reassurance that justice had been served. However, because of our “modern conditioning” via schools, media, secularism, and even our courts, a public execution would now elicit sympathy for the offender. And it would be an opportunity for the condemned to continue to plead his case. This speaks more about our cultural demise and less about any sort of justice.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  118. Dana, no doubt because our “modern conditioning via schools, media, secularism, and even our courts” preaches 24/7 that America is a fundamentally unjust society. So the accused is the innocent victim of the forces of evil. At least as long as the victim belongs to a protected category.

    I was reflecting on that when reading about all the slander aimed at Chris Kyle and “American Sniper,” particularly by the usual suspects calling him a coward and a psycho. Had the title of the movie been “Vietcong Sniper” those critics would have hailed his bravery and his compassion.

    Sorry for going off on a tangent and making this thread more about Islam than capital punishment. I mentioned the Charlie Hebdo murders in order to use contemporary events as an example of why capital punishment must always be a tool in your kit. All murders are an attack on the foundation of society. Usually indirectly as they’re generally over personal matters, random hate, sheer greed, or just thrill-seeking. But some murders are doubly so because the murders aren’t personal but political. The murders are planned as direct attacks on the foundations of society. Which is why I think societies that have outlawed capital punishment have made a huge mistake as they’re essentially saying their societies aren’t worth killing to keep.

    (One small digression; the Quran enjoins Muslims to never seek a truce when they are winning, consequently if they don’t think they’re in a position of strength they’ll seek a truce and martyrdom is much less attractive.)

    I sparked a backlash because of course I was being Islamophobic and racist and how dare I say we should kill over our values, etc.

    But it occurs to me that had I used Timothy McVeigh as an example, who also committed mass murder as a direct assault on the foundations of society, it would have passed unnoticed. The left in all the categories in all the opinion-maker categories you mentioned above, especially, would have enjoyed watching that guy publicly executed. Because he was white, so he represented the special evil of the ruling elite. Then they’d be enthusiastic about a public execution, just as even our “Free Mumia” media was ecstatic about racial profiling when they thought the DC sniper was white.

    That’s the problem with our “modern conditioning.”

    Steve57 (4ce020)

  119. 3. The Catholic Dana (1b79fa) — 1/17/2015 @ 10:37 am

    If people think that capital punishment is some sort of deterrent to crime — and I do not, or Texas would have the lowest murder rate of any state

    If capital punishment is not a deterrent, then clearly lesser punishments, like life imprisonment, also are not, and we would have the same rate if there was no punishment at all. And nobody should have been deterred by warnings about dangers from smoking or signs warning about high voltage. That is a reducto ad absurdum.

    No, capital punishment is indeed a deterrent, but the deterrent effect is disguised by two factors:

    1) The most important factor is the base felony rate in the state, and if people are stopped earlier, less of this happens. It’s the same principle as “broken windows.”

    2) Most criminals are not lawyers, or members of sophisticated criminal gangsa, and are not aware of the differences in punishment between different jurisdictions. Although they may be somewhat aware of differences in prosecution between different jurisdictions.

    It has been shown that actual executions do reduce murders, and they probably do so anywhere in the same metropolitan area.

    — then whatever deterrent effect there is is weakened by the way in which we do it.

    This is true. It’s the publicity that counts.

    But if people witness an execution, they don’t see the crime that responsible for the sentence, so it looks like killing an innocent person…sometimes like in Saudi Arabia, or one case in Texas at least, where somene was accused of setting a fire, that killed his children, that in fact was not arson it is. And Rick Perry, last I heard, was still too stupid or stubborn to realize that. Barack Obama, at least, can acknowledge he authorized the killing of people by mistake. It’s war.

    Sammy Finkelman (e806a6)

  120. bobathome (f208b6) — 1/19/2015 @ 9:14 am

    He [Obama] can stop the rise of oceans….

    No, no. Only Congress can do that, and the Waxman Markey bill died in the Senate in 2010. Killed by Harry Reid, actually, not a Republican filibuster. It didn’t even have 50 votes.

    http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/11/as-the-world-burns

    Obama seems to have forgotten about that by now, or given up, but he still may propose something to heal the planet.

    And the EPA is working on it, especially about methane. Never mind someone wrote a letter to the Wall Street Journal saying there are two fundamental mistakes here with methane: 1) its absortion bands are the same ones used by water vapor and 2) they are in the wrong part pof the spectrum to matter much.

    Sammy Finkelman (e806a6)

  121. In considering it, I think that at one point in time in our history, executions in the public square did not produce a sympathy in the witnesses for the offender, but rather a reassurance that justice had been served. However, because of our “modern conditioning” via schools, media, secularism, and even our courts, a public execution would now elicit sympathy for the offender. And it would be an opportunity for the condemned to continue to plead his case. This speaks more about our cultural demise and less about any sort of justice.

    I believe the term for this is pussification. A pussified society can not last.

    One of our biggest flaws is compassion for one’s enemies. Islamic terrorisdts do not have that, and neither do we.

    The terrorists have the wrong values, but the right ethos. And we, as a society, need to adopt the ethos that the only place for America’s enemies is Hell. That there should be neither compassion nor pity for America’s enemies. That America’s enemies are subhuman vermin not deserving of any rights. And indeed, a large part of the American public shares this ethos, as they have no objection to the torture of captured terrorists.

    Captured terrorists should be shot and then roasted in a brazen bull to ensure that they die. they are not protected by the Geneva Conventions nor the United States Constitution.

    We do not need to abolish the Eighth Amendment either. Under Supreme Court precedent, the definition of “cruel and unusual” relies on “evolving standards of decency” Trop v. Dulles, 356 U.S. 86 at 101 (1958) If a majority of Americans condone torturing criminals to death, then under Trop, it is not considered cruel and unusual.

    Michael Ejercito (45f52b)

  122. Mr Finkelman wrote:

    If capital punishment is not a deterrent, then clearly lesser punishments, like life imprisonment, also are not, and we would have the same rate if there was no punishment at all. And nobody should have been deterred by warnings about dangers from smoking or signs warning about high voltage. That is a reducto ad absurdum.

    You’re partially right: there’s almost no crime in which what normal people would consider the crime to be worth the punishment. You see it all the time: some clown goes into a Seven-Eleven, waves a gun and robs the place. He knows that the clerk can’t get to more than about $40 at a time, and showing that gun means five years, every time. The crime is obviously not worth the punishment.

    What really matters is whether criminals think that they’ll get caught, and whether they are facing a system which routinely allows plea bargains if they do get caught.

    The Dana not employing reductio ad absurdum (f6a568)

  123. Deterrence, shmeterrence. The only proven crime prevention method is incapacitation. Let’s be honest. We don’t punish people in order to “deter” them or others. We punish them because we’re mad at them for what they did. And sometimes we’re so outraged by what they did that we kill them for it. Incapacitation and retribution. And there’s money to be made in the prisoner industry in the United States. Deterrence, whether general or specific, and rehabilitation are nonsense. That’s not how criminals are; that’s not how people are.

    nk (dbc370)

  124. 125. …One of our biggest flaws is compassion for one’s enemies. Islamic terrorisdts do not have that, and neither do we.

    The terrorists have the wrong values, but the right ethos. And we, as a society, need to adopt the ethos that the only place for America’s enemies is Hell. That there should be neither compassion nor pity for America’s enemies. That America’s enemies are subhuman vermin not deserving of any rights. And indeed, a large part of the American public shares this ethos, as they have no objection to the torture of captured terrorists…

    Michael Ejercito (45f52b) — 1/20/2015 @ 7:13 am

    We once had that ethos from the bottom to the top in this country. In WWII Bull Halsey pronounced that once we were done with them, the only place the Japanese language would be spoken was in Hell. When ships sailed out of port in harbors in Halsey’s AOR there were large billboards on their way out that said “Kill Japs! Kill Japs! Kill more Japs!” Can you imagine what the bedwetting leftist twitter Sandanistas of today, that couldn’t stand that Americans are crowding into theaters to see American Sniper in such droves that it’s setting box office records, would have done then?

    The problem is that while the terrorists have the wrong values, we have a political elite on both sides of the Atlantic that doesn’t think our values are worth defending. They embarrassed by them, and apologize for them (If these killers are unislamic, why does a cartoon of Muhammad offend them?). And promise to mend our ways (If these atrocities have nothing to do with Islam, why should being more sensitive toward Muslim feelings and being more respectful of Islam be the solution?). So naturally they have the right ethos, and we don’t. They know and believe in what they’re fighting for. Our elites insist they’re not fighting. Except against Islamophobia.

    This attitude just invites attack. And don’t think a certain somebody hasn’t noticed.

    http://quran.com/47/35

    So do not weaken and call for peace while you are superior; and Allah is with you and will never deprive you of [the reward of] your deeds.

    Netanyahu has warned numerous times that while we have the means, we don’t have the will. On the other hand the Islamic world has the will, but not the means. The means, it appears from Obama’s mad rush to prostrate himself before Iran in the nuclear negotiations, is going to be a lot easier to acquire.

    It isn’t that the Europeans don’t share the same ethos. The average man on the street does. They’re fed up with their elites, too. Hence the mass rallies against the Islamization of Europe. If you actually look at opinion polls of Europe when it comes to things like gun possession or the death penalty (must. remain. on. topic.) they’re not always that far off from Americans. It’s just that those elites have determined that those opinions are beyond the political pale in civilized Europe. It’s the whole reason certain opinions have to be outlawed as “inciting religious or ethnic hatred.” If nobody was thinking those thoughts, they wouldn’t be outlawed. Lots of people of people are thinking them.

    As an aside, we can expect the parties the press reviles as anti-immigrant and ultra-right to gain from these latest terror attacks. A lot of average Europeans have decided they’re no longer worried what names the press is going to call them. They’d much rather live. As Mark Steyn put it, when widely held beliefs are declared to be too unsavory to be thought, spoken or (gasp) represented, then you can expect some pretty unsavory types to be the ones willing to represent them.

    I firmly believe that the abolition of the death penalty reflects an erosion of a nation’s will to defend its values. Sort of like having a gun in the house. If things become so peaceful you don’t need to employ them, that’s not the time to outlaw them. It means they have done and are doing their jobs. It isn’t that criminal or terrorist types have been eliminated from humanity. It means they’re the ones who’ve grown unconfident. Liberals have a hard time understanding this sort of logic. That’s why they ask questions like, “If the crime rate is so low, why are so many more criminals locked up than ever?” Hello! I really need to explain this to you?

    One of our biggest flaws will be if we fall for Hillary! and her idiotic belief that we must show respect for our enemies (compassion, yes, I’m all for showing compassion to our enemies once we’ve rendered them hors de combat or defeated them). So we’ll see if we have any sense left in November 2016. Because what we need to do is teach our enemies to respect us. Not to have contempt for us, like we’ve been doing.

    James Taylor, Secretary Kerry? Really?

    Steve57 (4ce020)

  125. The idea that Putin was behind this may not be so wild.

    One thing is clear: Abedy Coulabali was connected to people in Belguim who told him they were from ISIS, and who supplied him with weapons. And the Kouachi brothers, who got their weapons and some money from Coulibaly (who borrowed a lot of money from a bank right before) thought they were working for Al Qaeda in Yemen.

    And someone who has been a good source to the New York Times on AQAP who says he is part of them said they only were responsible for the attack on Charlie Hebdo and the other attack took place at the same time only because the Kouachi brothers and Coulibaly were friends.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/15/world/europe/al-qaeda-in-the-arabian-peninsula-charlie-hebdo.html

    That is the only way to reconcile what the two terrorists said, of course. Which is necessary to do in order for people not to suspect that there are some elements of a false flag operation in here – that at least Coulibaly lied to the Kouachi brothers.

    A member of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, who spoke to The New York Times on the condition of anonymity, said the joint timing of the two operations was a result of the friendship between Mr. Coulibaly and the Kouachi brothers, not of common planning between the Qaeda group and the Islamic State.

    Also see:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/16/us/fbi-chief-criticizes-times-on-qaeda-source.html

    Latest news: France security: Chechens arrested amid high alert

    I know they are against Russia.

    Well, that’s what the Moscow subway bombers were supposed to be too, in 1999.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Alexander_Litvinenko

    Alexander Litvinenko was a former officer of the Russian Federal Security service who escaped prosecution in Russia and received political asylum in Great Britain. In his books, Blowing up Russia: Terror from Within and Lubyanka Criminal Group, Litvinenko described Vladimir Putin’s rise to power as a coup d’état organised by the FSB. He alleged that a key element of FSB’s strategy was to frighten Russians by bombing apartment buildings in Moscow and other Russian cities.[7] He accused Russian secret services of having arranged the Moscow theater hostage crisis, through their Chechen agent provocateur, and having organised the 1999 Armenian parliament shooting.[8] He also stated that terrorist Ayman al-Zawahiri was under FSB control when he visited Russia in 1997.[9]

    He was probably really under Pakistani ISI control, but co-operating with Russia at the time.

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  126. 128. Steve57 (4ce020) — 1/20/2015 @ 8:30 am

    In WWII Bull Halsey pronounced that once we were done with them, the only place the Japanese language would be spoken was in Hell.

    He was wrong, wasn’t he?

    (If these killers are unislamic, why does a cartoon of Muhammad offend them?).

    A. First, it doesn’t really offend the people who sent them. That’s just an attempt to show their power and dominance.

    In fact, nobody can really explain where this comes from:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/15/world/attack-prompts-debate-on-the-roots-of-muslim-objection-to-image-making-.html?_r=0

    Less clear are the precise origins of the Muslim objection to visual depictions, insulting or otherwise, of the prophet and holy persons of any faith.

    That objection, which Islamist militants have cited as a reason for their deadly attack on Charlie Hebdo’s offices in Paris last week, has some roots in the Quran, which discourages image-making as a form of idol worship that demeans God.

    But Islamic scholars and legal experts say that the Quran does not explicitly prohibit image-making, and that while the act is considered a sin in some branches of Islam, in others it is not — and certainly not one deserving of death. Moreover, these experts point to a rich history of Islamic art forms that include celebratory depictions of Muhammad.

    It’s made up!!

    In the late Twentieth Century.

    There is a long tradition in Islamic art of avoiding depictions of any humans or animals, and they can argue blasphemy – but that hardly applies to non-Moslems, unless they want to kill non-Moslems for not thinking Mohammed was a true prophet. As al-Sissi said, that is an IMPOSSIBLE belief.

    Second, there’s nothing implausible about this being an Islamic heresy.

    Sammy Finkelman (e806a6)

  127. Common sense tells me that the death penalty may indeed deter some crimes, but only if there’s a credible threat of the death penalty actually being carried out. I don’t think there’s much of a deterrent effect from California’s death penalty, but I think there may be from, say, Texas’, Oklahoma’s, or Florida’s. I don’t think there is any empirical way to assess the deterrent effect of the death penalty in any event.

    Regardless, however, my support for capital punishment is based on principles of just retribution, not on some sort of factual assumption about its effectiveness as a deterrent. That future crimes committed by others may be deterred by any given defendant’s lawful execution is simply gravy, a societal benefit that’s unnecessary as a justification for the lawful retribution for the very worst of crimes. So I’m entirely untroubled by the fact that deterrence is speculative and unprovable.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  128. Again, I believe that 100 years ago, a public hanging did act as a deterrent, and to a far greater degree than what it would today. (Which would be no deterrent because the offender would then become the victim and the original victim would be lost in the outcry of the current victim’s suffering).

    Dana (8e74ce)

  129. Incapacitation is also deterrnce.

    In many times and places when there is a lot of crime, there is also kidnapping for ransom.

    Not in the United States.

    Since the 1930s it is crushed as soon as it rears its head and the perpetrators get 30 year prison sentences.

    No criminal tells another this is a good idea. Nobody has any experience carryinbg it out. They don’t even think of it.

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  130. nk,

    I think a society should be outraged at crimes like the one in the post. God help us if we aren’t.

    With that, we’re not who we were a hundred years ago, or even seventy years ago. And sometimes what looks and acts like compassion is just a broken down scale of justice, pounded and pummeled by a hammer of people who find it distasteful and wrong to be outraged and assign blame.

    Dana (8e74ce)

  131. Dana, personally I agree. I believe there are crimes so vile that society must express its disapproval in the most extreme way otherwise it becomes a tacit accomplice to them. This guy and Lockett included.

    nk (dbc370)

  132. nk wrote:

    I believe there are crimes so vile that society must express its disapproval in the most extreme way otherwise it becomes a tacit accomplice to them.

    In Pennsylvania, prosecutors do this by seeking the death penalty for heinous crimes, secure in the knowledge that it will never actually be carried out. Since the restoration of capital punishment, despite a couple hundred inmates on death row, only three men have actually been executed, and all three essentially volunteered for it by voluntarily dropping all of their appeals.

    The Dana in Pennsylvania (1b79fa)

  133. Key part of Sisi’s speech with subtititles

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POGpIt2U4s4&feature=youtu.be

    Daniel Pipes about this:

    http://www.danielpipes.org/15430/sisi-islam-reform

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  134. Crown Prince Salman has been declared king and Prince Muqrin became Crown Prince, according to the statement.

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)


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