Thinking is okay... just with you, well, its a way of life....

;^)

-d

I wonder if any of their victims kicked and screamed and begged for their lives?

I fully support the death penalty. I'm mean like that.

I definitely support the death penalty. My blog today includes one of the reasons why.

I'm one of those left-wing bleeding-heart liberals too, Billy.

Happens to the dharma students I know.

We abolished the death penalty but I am one of those people torn between whether it is a good thing or not. Some murders are just soooo brutal and savage and barbaric and most of all senseless.

I think the death penalty martyrs the evil and consigns the innocent-but-wrongly-convicted to a fate they haven't earned. It's too easy for us to make a mistake in court, it happens all the time. And in terms of punishment, to be denied human contact and held in solitary till your heart stops beating, spending decades in isolation and reflection, seems like a much better punishment than ending someone's life so they never have to think of what they did again. If we just want retribution, to make the victims feel better, our law should be that victims or survivors carry out the sentence. If we want to punish, to make convicts suffer, execution gives them way too easy a way out - in my opinion. I've never lost anyone to such a monster. Maybe that would change my mind.

I'm against it.

Why do people expect the someone being executed to go quietly?

I believe the real retribution comes from God when they are judged. However, I think it is the duty of our judicial system to get them to that state as quickly as possible. No one has the right to take another life expecting to keep thiers. If that's the case, you may as well give everyone one free murder.

Sorry, had to add this. They don't spend their time in prison alone for the rest of their days. They get TV, mail, a social life, special meals and visits from thier families in which they get to hug and hold those they love dear. While those of us(yes, me) that have a murdered love one only get to hold thier loved ones purse cause that's all that could be found in the rubble and it was the last thing she had that I could say good bye to.

Quite a moot topic. Dan has a good point about mistakes happening in Court where people are wrongly accused and then put to death. However, it is the taxpayers money which is used to "house" them, feed them and keep them alive. Our jailbirds even have the right to vote at general elections so they sort of still have "rights" whilst in jail. Unless the system can come up with a pay in which they successfully repay their debt to society, somehow, thus repaying the taxpayers money.

wlfldy - Yes, I agree with your comment and am sorry to read you have experienced a loved one being murdered. It is different with white collar crime but murderers get a lot of priviledges which is not fair. The sentence should fit the crime.

All the executions in my beloved state give us quite a name. Does the average insane criminal ever stop in mid-murder to think... Oh Gee, I might get lethal injection if I do this? Of course not. Those who claim it serves as a deterrent are misguided. I, too, am torn on this issue. My gut feeling though - it is wrong to take a life, be you the criminal or the judge.