At dinner the other night I found myself in the middle of a rather heated debate with a staunch Liberal. For the most part I consider myself a Republican however the classification is murky at best (a phrase that came out of that evening was “Fiscally Republican, Socially Democratic). Where my views on government, politics and social agendas have moved back and forth across the lines with the issues I find myself identifying more and more with the Democratic party.
Reading these articles today (see: http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2003/8/16/164754/560 and http://www.wm3.org/) and some various other news of late I find myself more and more against the death penalty. In a society where the police can use any means of deception at their disposal in an interrogation my trust for the results have only lessened over time. Honestly, how many hours with a skilled interrogator do you think you could honestly withstand before you were swearing that the earth was flat?
With politically charged, front page news crimes how important is it, and how much pressure are the police under to arrest and convict someone… anyone?
Recently the outgoing Governor of Illinois conducted a mass pardon of death row inmates converting their sentences to life in prison. With more than 60% of the country supporting the death penalty this was a very unpopular more.
What I have been struggling with is, is it right to have a death penalty if even one person is wrongly executed? How sure can we ever be that the evidence/trial/etc… was conducted perfectly and flawlessly. Can we risk it?
For more information on the death penalty check out www.deathpenaltyinfo.org.