At least once a week a local or national politician has a big press conference to call for stronger penalties against some heinous crime or another. Who could argue that tougher penalties against rapists and murderers is not a good thing.
But this has gotten ridiculous. Crime has become an issue that gives politicians a chance to hide from tough issues which require thought and resolve to address. Health care. Poverty. Unemployment. Outsourcing of our jobs overseas. Separation of Church and State. Real tax policy reform. But these issues might piss off some voters who disagree, so politicians take the safe route and have a press release calling for stiffer penalties on criminals. Of course the politicians won't tell us how they're going to pay for more incarceration time for all the criminals because that would require a tax increase and God forbid we ask the voters to pay for something when Bush and Reagan proved deficits don't matter.
I'm not a death penalty supporter. Anyone that thinks it deters any criminal from committing criminal acts is criminally foolish. But it would come in handy if we just went ahead and used the death penalty on all crimes beyond simple traffic tickets. That would put an end to politicians using crime as a propaganda tool and give them time to grow the kahunas to tackle issues they currently lack the kahunas to address.
15 comments:
Truth, I read where it actually costs us more to put someone to death than it does to just lock them up for life. Apparently the appeals process is costly.
I think if we legalized weed and taxed it we might find oursleves becoming a much more mellower society.
Mellow people do not commit crimes.
I agree with you TAO. I'm just fed up with pandering and hiding from issues that need to be addressed but politicians refuse to avoid controversy. I am almost to the point that term limits sound like a good idea. If nothing else it would put a deadline on some of these clowns to actually accomplish something good instead of having an album of newspaper clippings and nothing else to show for a career in office.
Nothing to show for their public service?
Come on Truth...most of them have alot to show for their political careers...its called easy money.
Truth, the war on poverty would cause quite a stir among voters and politicians who disagree, don’t you think? We’ve been fighting that war for over 40 years and haven’t won.
As far as the death penalty discouraging criminals. Is there actual proof that it doesn’t deter? Personally I would think twice before committing a capital offense if I knew I could be executed. But then again, I’m not mentally ill. And I do believe that to commit those types of crimes one has to have a few screws loose or totally missing.
Tao, you’re correct; it does cost more to execute someone than it does to incarcerate them for life. Outrageous, but true.
Morally I have no problem with the concept of the death penalty. The high cost is largely an effect of the anti-death penalty movement.
However, it has been conclusively proven that the main crime we execute people in this country for is having a bad lawyer. A close second is being arrested in an election year.
Our system is not accurate enough in identifying the 'bad guy' to have a penalty that is forever.
Rational people are deterred by the fine for illegal parking. Criminals aren't deterred by much of anything until they get caught. Then they worry about how much time they will get
Can't argue the war on poverty with you Pamela. Not even Iraq and Afghanistan will go on that long.
OMR is correct in his assessment.
If America were a nation of laws, then we wouldn’t have one set of legal standards for citizens, and another for high officials and members of congress. If Americans valued the legal traditions that founded this country, we wouldn’t see the most contemptible politicians returned to congress election after election. Plus, the only substantial difference between prisons and congress is that congressional inmates are still awaiting trial.
I usually do not engage in debates about the death penalty; it is a matter for the people of each state to decide form themselves. Let me simply observe that when someone has been put to death, there is little chance that person will destroy the lives of any other persons. Polly Klaas would still be alive if the state put her murderer to death when previously convicted for the same offense. In such matters, the costs of a death penalty case seem irrelevant. If this process requires any adjustment, then it should be the period for appellate review. Current and relevant statistics do not convince me that penitentiaries offer meaningful rehabilitation or substantial changes in behavior. If we err, let us err on the side of society, rather than someone with too many X chromosomes; let us stop training first time felons to become hardened recidivist members of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Mustang - I had just about the exact same position as you... right up until DNA matching came out and freed a slew of wrongfully convicted death row inmates.
And you might think that DNA matching would fix the problem now, but reading between the lines, it mostly looks like prosecuters are getting better at surpressing it instead.
Locking someone up for 12 consecutive life sentences has a zero recidivism rate also; but you can take it back if it turns out you got the wrong guy.
(If you've seen the 'justice' system railroad someone up close and personal, you'll never look at it the same again.)
Ah, but OMR, every good thing has collateral damage...
As Mustang says, "If we err, let us err on the side of society..."
While the concept of 'society' is fundamental in justice it has no relevency in the debate on anything else.
"Society" and "Our Way of Life" are critical in the concept of our justice, law and order, and defense sectors but individualism and free markets are surpreme in all other aspects of our "society"
Lynch mobs are a fundamental aspect of 'society'
Well, I think Truth actually was speaking to the larger point of the liberal use of smoke and mirrors politicians hide behind to mask their ineptness at actually being able to address real issues.
But, since the specter of the death penalty has taken center stage, I'd like to add my two cents.
As most of you know now (and are probably tired of hearing) I work in a large jail and usually I work the "bad boy" tower where the worst of the worst are incarcerated. We have a "very bad boy" floor where killers and crazies await trial.
And North Carolina has a death penalty, which I support. Why? Because when you have been around cold blooded killers you realize that even though they may look human and sound human, they are NOTHING like the rest of us at all. I don't believe in using the death penalty as revenge but as insurance - that there will be no chance these monsters will ever be paroled or escape. Like a rabid animal, there is no cure and our only choice is to put them down.
Because, if they find a way out, like Ted Bundy did when he escaped from CO, they will continue to kill. (Ted went to Florida and killed all those college girls - his last act).
Even though the appeals process is expensive and arduous, I would not change it, because it gives the defense ample time to produce DNA or any other evidence that might clear the defendant.
DNA is a double edged sword. Say you have a rape case or rape and murder. Cops get their guy but DNA doesn't match. What if THERE WERE TWO OF THEM and one held the victim while the other did the rape and then this guy shot her? Or whatever.
My point is you can't depend too heavily on any one form of evidence to prove guilt or innocence.
But I'm with TAO on drug reform. The system is overburdened with the incarceration of nonviolent drug users. Legalizing marijuana, and I would include heroin and cocaine, would go a long way to easing the burden. If you take the profit out of dealing these drugs you help put the gangs out of business.
You're a sane and rational person Rocky. But the thugs you guard are not. The death penalty, hell, any penalty won't deter them. I fully support three strikes and you're out laws for violent criminals. I just think the death penalty is too good for them. Let the unreformable rot with each other.
"Let the unreformable rot with each other."
Only if we can throw them in a deep, deep pit and tell them they aren't getting any food and will just have to improvise...
Your proposal sounds reasonable Rocky. I accept.
And I though I was tough on crime for a Liberal.
Talk about timely, look at this.
Sigh. All the coolest politicians are Democrats right now.
My Sunday paper carried the article about Jim Webb. He has some really rational ideas, now if someone would just listen to him!
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