Death Penalty?

[afleitch]

Strongly oppose.

[courts]

So how would you explain that Europe has MUCH lower rates of violent crimes than America even though we don't use the penalty you believe criminals fear most?

most studies i've seen on the matter indicate that the death penalty does have some deterrent effect (e.g. mocan, 2006). personally, i support the death penalty. in fact my position on this is pretty much what cassius just posted assuming he isn't just trolling you all. my main problem with it is that killers wait so long on death row and cost the tax payers so much with their unnecessary appeals that we might as well not have one.

So you're suggesting America's murder rate would be even higher than it already is without the death penalty?

it's possible yes. but if people live about as long (or longer) awaiting execution as people serving 20 to life the effect is lessened. anyway as loathsome as blair was i think his slogan 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime' had a ring of truth to it. when you look at who is on death row or in prison for violent crimes an alarming number of them are child abuse victims (specifically brain damaged). what left wingers have to say about poverty and childcare/protective services and crime is actually, a somewhat valid point.

[Hifly]

Strongly Oppose. Although maybe some Drug dealers deserve it.

[YL]

Very much against, both because of a strong instinct that it's wrong and because of concerns about the wrongly convicted.

[ElectionsGuy]

Strongly Oppose. Although maybe some Drug dealers deserve it.

Drug dealers? Out of all people, you want drug dealers to have the death penalty? How about massive serial killers if anything?

[TDAS04]

There are horrific cases where it is difficult not to want the perpetrators dead, but I have to oppose the right of society to kill its members.  People are imperfect, and thus, imperfect judges.  There are people who should die, but the power to determine who deserves to die should be out of the hand of all imperfect human beings.  It is inevitable that society will kill someone who does not to deserve to die if society has the right to kill at all.  Therefore, society should not be entrusted with this power, a power with dire consequences when abused.

[angus]

opposed in all cases.  I'd vote against it in any binding or non-binding referendum.

Nothing to debate.  It's a normative proposition, and indefensible, but it's my position and I've held it all my life and I probably won't ever budge from it. 

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

If it doesn't deter anyone from killing, it should not be an option unless it's symbolically necessary.

[angus]

Ann Richards made probably the best case I've ever heard for capital punishment.  She said, "We don't know what else to do with them."  She could be an abrasive bitch, but she was right about that.

It's probably true that capital punishment is a deterrent since, after all, being dead deters you from doing stuff.  It's also probably true that it brings 'closure' (politicallycorrectspeak for 'vengeance') to the families of victims, since eyes for eyes always have great mass appeal.  And it's probably also true that death is more merciful than the daily gang rape and beatings and castration and other sorts of degradation and torture that awaits those incarcerated for the murder of children.  However, none of that justifies policy, if the policy is simply to keep people safe.  The best argument for killing an adult human--besides self-defense or being ordered to by a military commander--is that you really don't have the inclination to do anything else with a person that you consider to be beyond rehabilitation.  Her argument never swayed me, since I'm predisposed against it for non-debatible reasons, but I do give her credit for her honesty.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Support it but only on a limited basis.