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So if an 80 year old is convicted of tax evasion and sentenced to 10 years in prison, we should execute him?

Indeed. It's nice to have this dicsussion without it degrading into horrible and unproductive mud-slinging. If only other big political threads here would do the same...

But yeah, I'll be the first to agree with you that the whole justice system needs a major amount of work. We've got so many flaws and so many systems that are focused on punishment and not enough towards rehabilitation. For-profit prisons and a woefully inadequate public defense system more or less guarantee that people fall into a repeated cycle of crime that will not improve. But to avoid getting too off topic on this threat, I think the big question is whether or not capital punishment has a place in this reformed and reworked justice system.

As for the question of difference in letting a convict die naturally behind bars or execution, I would say there is a significant difference. The first and most obvious being that only one has an execution date, and makes a show of the person's death. Obviously not as big as say, a French Revolution execution, but there's certainly enough of coverage, viewing and news about it to make it a spectacle regardless of intent. Likewise, and correct me if I'm wrong, some states have that little viewing chamber for the victims to watch. To me, that is so unseemly and skeeves me out fiercely. And it is your difference there, one is you die of disease or natural causes....the other you are strapped down and made a spectacle of. Very different things.

Going back to coercion and confessions, though, the popular mental image of a coerced confession is that dark interrogation room where the cameras are off and the 'bad cop' goes all out to get it. The fact of the matter is that even on documented, legit interrogations you get someoen confessing to crimes they didn't commit. It is a psychological thing where eventually that stress and desperation boil over, and even if the cops do everything right, you get a false confession.

 d-usa wrote:
So if an 80 year old is convicted of tax evasion and sentenced to 10 years in prison, we should execute him?

Well, that depends. Would I like to execute the CEOs of Enron who put millions out of work as they gobbled money? Sure. But that's just me, and so as soceity I'd say no. In regards to your point, I can see what you're trying to do, and I think it's rather unfair. You know full well when I refer to heinous crimes, tax evasion would not fall under that. In regards to him dying in prison from old age, he'd only have served maybe 5-6 of the 10 years, so that's not really applicable to the 50 or 60 someone else would serve.


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 curran12 wrote:
Indeed. It's nice to have this dicsussion without it degrading into horrible and unproductive mud-slinging. If only other big political threads here would do the same...

But yeah, I'll be the first to agree with you that the whole justice system needs a major amount of work. We've got so many flaws and so many systems that are focused on punishment and not enough towards rehabilitation. For-profit prisons and a woefully inadequate public defense system more or less guarantee that people fall into a repeated cycle of crime that will not improve. But to avoid getting too off topic on this threat, I think the big question is whether or not capital punishment has a place in this reformed and reworked justice system.

As for the question of difference in letting a convict die naturally behind bars or execution, I would say there is a significant difference. The first and most obvious being that only one has an execution date, and makes a show of the person's death. Obviously not as big as say, a French Revolution execution, but there's certainly enough of coverage, viewing and news about it to make it a spectacle regardless of intent. Likewise, and correct me if I'm wrong, some states have that little viewing chamber for the victims to watch. To me, that is so unseemly and skeeves me out fiercely. And it is your difference there, one is you die of disease or natural causes....the other you are strapped down and made a spectacle of. Very different things.

Agreed. Would private execution be better, or worse? I always thought the spectacle thing was kind of weird, but I could understand in this case, the father wanting to be there to see it, hence the whole revenge thing.

Going back to coercion and confessions, though, the popular mental image of a coerced confession is that dark interrogation room where the cameras are off and the 'bad cop' goes all out to get it. The fact of the matter is that even on documented, legit interrogations you get someoen confessing to crimes they didn't commit. It is a psychological thing where eventually that stress and desperation boil over, and even if the cops do everything right, you get a false confession.

Agreed. With that, I don't know. I think that that transcends death penalties, and applies to even crimes like grand theft auto or possession. What could be done to fix that? Not sure, other than actually following through on convicting police and trying to break the "fraternity" attitude mos police departments have of "Don't snitch on a fellow cop".

 jreilly89 wrote:
Reposting what I said to the other user. Read the link I posted about Charles Manson. What's the point of having criminals in prison when we're going to deny their appeals up to 12 times and just keep them in lock up until they die of age. Is that really that much different from getting revenge? The guy is still locked away for life and effectively sentenced to death.

But being locked away for life is not effectively sentenced to death. It is, in fact, life in prison, which might be until the prisoner dies of natural causes. There's a pretty big difference between being put to death, and living another 40 or so years.

There's a lot of moving parts in what you said and I don't want to rebut them all, but "keeping someone in prison until they aren't a danger to society" is an important factor, but not the only one. For good or ill, punishment is an element of imprisonment, and a just punishment might exceed the length of time you are too dangerous to be a member of free society.

And, while this isn't directed at you, putting someone to death because it's cheaper - which it isn't, but let's presume it is - is a pretty immoral thing to do. I don't think it's appropriate to execute otherwise healthy people solely to save a few bucks.

 Ouze wrote:

 jreilly89 wrote:
Reposting what I said to the other user. Read the link I posted about Charles Manson. What's the point of having criminals in prison when we're going to deny their appeals up to 12 times and just keep them in lock up until they die of age. Is that really that much different from getting revenge? The guy is still locked away for life and effectively sentenced to death.

But being locked away for life is not effectively sentenced to death. It is, in fact, life in prison, which might be until the prisoner dies of natural causes. There's a pretty big difference between being put to death, and living another 40 or so years.

There's a lot of moving parts in what you said and I don't want to rebut them all, but "keeping someone in prison until they aren't a danger to society" is an important factor, but not the only one. For good or ill, punishment is an element of imprisonment, and a just punishment might exceed the length of time you are too dangerous to be a member of free society.

And, while this isn't directed at you, putting someone to death because it's cheaper - which it isn't, but let's presume it is - is a pretty immoral thing to do. I don't think it's appropriate to execute otherwise healthy people solely to save a few bucks.

Ouze, you raise a lot of good points. I just don't see the overall benefit of repeated appeals. Sure, I'd argue Manson is still probably dangerous, but 12 appeals? Jeebus.

Second, I agree. Life in prison is an important punishment, not one I want to do away with. I'm simply trying to suggest an alternative for certain criminals.

Third, agreed. I know capital punishment is dangerous ground and I would never want to execute a man on the chance he is innocent. That being said, there are some I'd declare unhealthy people unfit for society and for them I think capital punishment is a fair sentence.

Thanks for the interesting points.

 d-usa wrote:
Why are people pretending that life in prison doesn't exist and the only choice is killing them or releasing them?

I don't think anyone is ignoring life in prison as an option, I think we are just talking about specifically capital punishment. the argument from my understanding is there should be no capital punishment, I don't think anyone disagrees with life in prison.

Heinous crimes would not be hard to define.

Pre-meditated serial killing. cannibalism after said serial killing. the Dahmers, Bundies, Mansons, and Ed Geins are the ones I think of when abducating for the Death Penalty. I not talking abou the guy that comes home, finds his wife in bed with the neighbor, kills them both, then realizes oh crud, I just killed 2 people. there is a reason there is Murder 1, 2, and 3 so on and so forth.

You rape a child, you die. chemical castration is all well and good, but it is easily defeated. You rape and torture multiple women, while holding them hostage in your basement, and kill them when your done, you die.

I think we can all agree there is a need for different versions. Manslaughter vs murder. Although I could argue that if you get in a vehicle drunk, kill someone, its murder but that's a different discussion.

d-usa wrote:I am well known to be anti-death penalty, and this report only reinforces my position. For me it's bad enough that there is a high risk that an innocent person gets the needle. But when you add the danger that an innocent person get's subjected to this level of incompetence it just makes it worse. You can still execute innocent people with nitrogen hypoxia, but at least the innocent person goes without suffering.

I fail to see why this is an issue.

1. If someone deserves to die, then he deserves to suffer. The fact that he is subject to "incompetence" and so suffers seems to me to be a non-issue. "We botched the execution and he suffered." "Is he dead?" "Yes." "Then what's the problem?" "He suffered a lot." "Good. So did his victims."

2. Presumably, the man in question was guilty. Due process, reasonable doubt and all.

If you bring up DNA evidence, I'll point out that this actually is an argument against your views.

 Traditio wrote:

d-usa wrote:I am well known to be anti-death penalty, and this report only reinforces my position. For me it's bad enough that there is a high risk that an innocent person gets the needle. But when you add the danger that an innocent person get's subjected to this level of incompetence it just makes it worse. You can still execute innocent people with nitrogen hypoxia, but at least the innocent person goes without suffering.

I fail to see why this is an issue.

1. If someone deserves to die, then he deserves to suffer. The fact that he is subject to "incompetence" and so suffers seems to me to be a non-issue. "We botched the execution and he suffered." "Is he dead?" "Yes." "Then what's the problem?" "He suffered a lot." "Good. So did his victims."

2. Presumably, the man in question was guilty. Due process, reasonable doubt and all.

In the same post, you embraced the part of the constitution that provides for due process, but not the part of the constitution that forbids cruel & unusual punishment? Consistency really took it in the shorts there.

Ouze wrote:In the same post, you embraced the part of the constitution that provides for due process, but not the part of the constitution that forbids cruel & unusual punishment? Consistency really took it in the shorts there.

I only appealed to the constitution to point out that, ex hypothesi, the condemned criminal has been proven to be guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Persons who are guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of particularly heinous crimes deserve to die, and not only that, but to die painful deaths proportionate to their crimes.

A man is convicted of serial arson and, consequently, murder?

Even the brazen bull is not out of the question for him.

Well, I guess we circled back to torture fantasy again.

 Ouze wrote:

 Traditio wrote:

d-usa wrote:I am well known to be anti-death penalty, and this report only reinforces my position. For me it's bad enough that there is a high risk that an innocent person gets the needle. But when you add the danger that an innocent person get's subjected to this level of incompetence it just makes it worse. You can still execute innocent people with nitrogen hypoxia, but at least the innocent person goes without suffering.

I fail to see why this is an issue.

1. If someone deserves to die, then he deserves to suffer. The fact that he is subject to "incompetence" and so suffers seems to me to be a non-issue. "We botched the execution and he suffered." "Is he dead?" "Yes." "Then what's the problem?" "He suffered a lot." "Good. So did his victims."

2. Presumably, the man in question was guilty. Due process, reasonable doubt and all.

In the same post, you embraced the part of the constitution that provides for due process, but not the part of the constitution that forbids cruel & unusual punishment? Consistency really took it in the shorts there.

Hard men on the internet have no need for consistency. One can stroke their (metaphorical?) rage boner, or employ rational thought, but not both.

 Ouze wrote:
Well, I guess we circled back to torture fantasy again.

It's not torture fantasy. The notion that a given punishment should be proportionate to the crime which merited that punishment is an ancient notion. Figures of no less caliber than Aristotle and Immanuel Kant come to mind.

 Traditio wrote:

d-usa wrote:I am well known to be anti-death penalty, and this report only reinforces my position. For me it's bad enough that there is a high risk that an innocent person gets the needle. But when you add the danger that an innocent person get's subjected to this level of incompetence it just makes it worse. You can still execute innocent people with nitrogen hypoxia, but at least the innocent person goes without suffering.

I fail to see why this is an issue.

1. If someone deserves to die, then he deserves to suffer. The fact that he is subject to "incompetence" and so suffers seems to me to be a non-issue. "We botched the execution and he suffered." "Is he dead?" "Yes." "Then what's the problem?" "He suffered a lot." "Good. So did his victims."

2. Presumably, the man in question was guilty. Due process, reasonable doubt and all.

If you bring up DNA evidence, I'll point out that this actually is an argument against your views.

So the state should not have to follow their own laws?

Or are you not aware of what the actual issue is because you didn't read the actual articles or report?

d-usa wrote:So the state should not have to follow their own laws?

They most certainly should. I won't deny that incompetence has been displayed. Note carefully, however, what the articles do not say:

1.The men were innocent.

2. They failed to kill the condemned criminals.

Should the appropriate procedures have been followed? Yes.

Is the failure to follow the correct procedures really cause for public outcry? Meh. Not really.

Guilty and dangerous men are dead. Good enough for me.

Is the failure to follow the correct procedures cause to abolish the death penalty?

I imagine that you wouldn't make the same arguments in the case of abortion.

1) despite your weird logical jumps you are, indeed, arguing that you are okay with the state violating the laws as long as the death penalty is carried out in some sort of fashion.

2) despite being pro-choice, I am pretty comfortable saying that practitioners who don't follow the law or who perform substandard and botched abortions should have their license taken away and that abortions should be carried out in compliance with the law.

3) as you quoted in your earlier post, I am anti-death penalty but I have also argued, in this very thread, that if it is to remain legal they should follow the recommendation and switch to our backup method which is less likely to cause suffering to innocent people or in case the state decides to again ignore the laws.

 d-usa wrote:
1) despite your weird logical jumps you are, indeed, arguing that you are okay with the state violating the laws as long as the death penalty is carried out in some sort of fashion.

Are you up in arms about the Clinton email scandal?

At any rate, I wouldn't call it being "okay with the state violating the laws."

Clearly, agents of the state should follow the laws/appropriate procedures. I just don't think it's newsworthy or cause for public concern if they don't, at least in certain cases.

Cases of incompetence, failure to follow correct procedures,etc. are probably rampant all over (and not just in cases of state employees).

In most cases, it's difficult for anyone to care.

Do you get up in arms if your mailman doesn't technically follow the correct procedures? As long as your privacy isn't infringed and you get your mail in a timely fashion, probably not.

Why should you or I care that guilty and dangerous people were killed incorrectly?

despite being pro-choice, I am pretty comfortable saying that practitioners who don't follow the law or who perform substandard and botched abortions should have their license taken away and that abortions should be carried out in compliance with the law.

Noted.

3) as you quoted in your earlier post, I am anti-death penalty but I have also argued, in this very thread, that if it is to remain legal they should follow the recommendation and switch to our backup method which is less likely to cause suffering to innocent people or in case the state decides to again ignore the laws.

My question is simply this: why should innocent people even be relevant? Ex hypothesi, the persons in question are guilty. They have been proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt as judged 1. by a judge and 2. a jury of their peers.

So to summarize, and to make sure I understand you correctly: You don't care if the state doesn't follow the law when executing people and it's okay if innocent people die as long as a jury convicted them and I should care about Hillaries emails and my postman instead?


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I think we are at the usual point of any death penalty thread. Time to lock it up.

Every day, this forum gets just a little worse.

 d-usa wrote:
So to summarize, and to make sure I understand you correctly: You don't care if the state doesn't follow the law when executing people and it's okay if innocent people die as long as a jury convicted them and I should care about Hillaries emails and my postman instead?

I didn't say any of those things. This is a gross mischaracterization of what I said.


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D-USA:

I tell you what.

This was in Oklahoma, right? Give me the name of one of the convicted felons who were subjected to a "botched" execution. Then tell me what his crime(s) was/were. Tell me the name(s) of his victim(s). Tell me the sufferings that his victim(s) endured, what they had to go through.

And then explain to me why I should care in the slightest that the agents of the State "botched" his execution.

So ignoring the constitution is ok as long as it's the botched execution of people that, your standards of who deserves this punishment, get it?

Why should I repeat myself while you pretend you didn't say what you said?

Bur at this point it's safe to walk away from this thread because we have already covered the torture porn, need for revenge, innocent deaths are acceptable, and I didn't say what I said boxes on the bingo card.

Lock her up boys.

 Traditio wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
So to summarize, and to make sure I understand you correctly: You don't care if the state doesn't follow the law when executing people and it's okay if innocent people die as long as a jury convicted them and I should care about Hillaries emails and my postman instead?

I didn't say any of those things. This is a gross mischaracterization of what I said.


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D-USA:

I tell you what.

This was in Oklahoma, right? Give me the name of one of the convicted felons who were subjected to a "botched" execution. Then tell me what his crime(s) was/were. Tell me the name(s) of his victim(s). Tell me the sufferings that his victim(s) endured, what they had to go through.

And then explain to me why I should care in the slightest that the agents of the State "botched" his execution.

Actually... I think the debate is whether or not these "botched" executions triggers the "cruel and unusual" clause of the 8th Amendment.

I honestly don't know... but, "gut feeling" is that it is, but I'm biased in this*.


*for the record, I'm against death penalty pretty much for the same reasons why I'm against the abortion procedures.

 Traditio wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
Well, I guess we circled back to torture fantasy again.

It's not torture fantasy. The notion that a given punishment should be proportionate to the crime which merited that punishment is an ancient notion. Figures of no less caliber than Aristotle and Immanuel Kant come to mind.

Aristotle also thought earthquakes were caused by wind. The caliber of his figure is "Grossly ignorant ancient, clever for his time". I've no interest in taking lessons on proportionality from a dudes where "Set people on fire" was an acceptable act of criminal justice, unless that lesson is "Setting people on fire is bad" which is one I think we've already collectively learned. People in the past have consistently proven to be wrong about pretty much everything except math. Heck even in the relatively short history of our country we've had obvious and inarguable wrongs, like slavery and the subsequent bloody war fought to defend the institution. I'm certain our descendants will look down on us and our pitiable ignorance and barbrism that we see as normal and they'll be correct too.

Guys, reel it in. I was gone for an hour most and a polite discussion dissolved into murder rage revenge fantasy vs. the punishment fits the crime.

We can be polite after all.

On topic, while I'm all for capital punishment, I do argue it should be humane and not people flayed at the stick or tied to wild horses and ripped apart. We are a reasonable society after all, not barbarians or gladiators.

 jreilly89 wrote:
Guys, reel it in. I was gone for an hour most and a polite discussion dissolved into murder rage revenge fantasy vs. the punishment fits the crime.

We can be polite after all.

On topic, while I'm all for capital punishment, I do argue it should be humane and not people flayed at the stick or tied to wild horses and ripped apart. We are a reasonable society after all, not barbarians or gladiators.

It was a nice thread while it lasted.

Chongara wrote:Aristotle also thought earthquakes were caused by wind.

Category error.

Politics/ethics =/= natural science.

I've no interest in taking lessons on proportionality from a dudes where "Set people on fire" was an acceptable act of criminal justice, unless that lesson is "Setting people on fire is bad" which is one I think we've already collectively learned.

That only speaks to your own biases. What reason do you have to exclude, a priori, the possibility that burning someone to death might be proportionate to his crime?

Consider the case of the serial arsonist and murderer.


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whembly wrote:Actually... I think the debate is whether or not these "botched" executions triggers the "cruel and unusual" clause of the 8th Amendment.

I'm not even entirely sure what this means.

Is the question whether the procedures, if correctly followed, violate the 8th amendment?

Is the question whether the agents of the State, having failed to follow the procedures, violated the 8th amendment (accidentally and due to their incompetence)?

But if the question is the latter, it seems to me to be a category mistake. The bill of rights restricts the legality of state/federal law. It would seem strange to sue someone for violating the 8th amendment, no?

I honestly don't know... but, "gut feeling" is that it is, but I'm biased in this*.

The 8th amendment as understood and intended by the authors of the constitution?

The dudes who were fine with hanging people? That amendment? Those guys?

*for the record, I'm against death penalty pretty much for the same reasons why I'm against the abortion procedures.

My position is simple. I believe that there is such a thing as justice, and that justice consists in giving each according to his due. An unborn child does not deserve to die. A convicted criminal very well might. To use the Aristotelian concept, the death penalty (and a very painful one, at that) very well could be a punishment which is arithmetically proportionate to the crimes of a given convict.

 Traditio wrote:

Chongara wrote:Aristotle also thought earthquakes were caused by wind.

Category error.

Politics/ethics =/= natural science.

I've no interest in taking lessons on proportionality from a dudes where "Set people on fire" was an acceptable act of criminal justice, unless that lesson is "Setting people on fire is bad" which is one I think we've already collectively learned.

That only speaks to your own biases. What reason do you have to exclude, a priori, the possibility that burning someone to death might be proportionate to his crime?

Consider the case of the serial arsonist and murderer.

One cannot be a reasonable, thinking human being and consider deliberately setting another person on fire.

feeder wrote:One cannot be a reasonable, thinking human being and consider deliberately setting another person on fire.

Why not?

 Traditio wrote:
My question is simply this: why should innocent people even be relevant? Ex hypothesi, the persons in question are guilty. They have been proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt as judged 1. by a judge and 2. a jury of their peers.

...

It must be nice to have such a sheltered and naive view of the world. I imagine it makes it so much easier to avoid thinking about a lot of awkward and uncomfortable truths...

I think jreailly89 makes a good point about the difference if any between death and 68 years of life imprisonment.

My answer is that under our western Christian ethics, there is always the chance of remorse, forgiveness and redemption, which is not possible after death.