Another letter for the death penalty

[Valigator]

Sister, you can make all the noise you would like, there are some people on this earth that are pure evil, and the sooner they are taken out of the world's airspace the better...I applaud you for your efforts but I am on the other side, sometimes the death penalty is all that is left, and the sooner they meet their maker the better it is for all of us...

http://www.catholicexplorer.com/expl...ff-out-d.shtml

this is the nun they made the movie about

[PJgunner]

Well said Val.
Paul B.

[L. Cooper]

I agree with Val that there are some people that we are much better off without, and am no pacifist. But I am opposed to the death penalty for only one reason.

The system makes mistakes. There is ample proof that innocent people sometimes, just sometimes, do get convicted. Since death is kind of irreversable, I think a society should not execute people.

Now, please, don't think l want to see us releasing dangerous criminals into society. I do not! But I am opposed to killing them, only because the system has screwed up in the past, and I suspect that, since it is made up of humans, it will screw up in the future.

[Valigator]

"If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a tough call."

John McAdams - Marquette University/Department of Political Science, on deterrence

May 2006 scheduled executions....

http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/Pending/06/may06.htm

[L. Cooper]

Val, that ignores the question, and is very faulty logic. We should kill people on speculation that it might work as a deterrent??

The question I pose is how many innocent people is it OK to execute? One? Twenty-seven?

Deterrence is irrelevant to the question of executing wrongly convicted people.

The question of deterrence is another issue entirely, and no one has ever been able to prove that severity of punishment has anything to do with deterrence. I'm all in favor of deterrence, but let's make sure whatever we do is, in fact, a deterrent.

[Valigator]

First off you and I could go forever debating this issue and trust me we will not end up friends....you maintain your position and I will maintain mine OK...I will say, though I did not invite a debate..I do not feel the need to defend my position on this issue, just as you do not need to defend yours.

PS this site and the people on it are a little dearer to me than any other site I participate in and that is a no-win discussion for either side...