The more that I think about it, capital punishment offers no advantages over life without parole (I'll call it LWOP from now on), especially the way it is used in America.

- LWOP is a worse punishment. The knowledge that freedom is not a possibility is near torturous for any sentient being, especially humans. The death penalty would be putting the criminal out of his misery.

- Prisons are much more secure than they were in the past. I will concede that capital punishment was justified for most of history on the grounds that escape was a distinct possibility and it would be irresponsible to hold a dangerous criminal in a nonsecure prison.

- With all of the appeals and other expenses, carrying out the death penalty is more expensive than holding a prisoner for the remainder of his life.

- Lastly, there's always the chance of executing the wrong guy, which would be a horrible tragedy.

For the record, I still support the death penalty for military infractions, such as wartime treason, desertion, or cowardice.

Are you sure that the death penalty is more expensive than life without parole?

And punishment for pure vengeance is pointless. The justification for punishment is that it's a learning experience. If the person is going to live out the rest of his life as a punishment, there's no point to the punishment itself besides vengeance. And when you think about it most people that commit crimes worthy of the death penalty have other severe problems. It's not their fault they were born with a brain that made them want to do things that warrant the death penalty. I know it sounds silly at first, but it could really be any of us. Whose to say that you or I couldn't have been born with a birth defect that made us want to be serial killers?

Just in case my point got lost in there, I'm not saying let them free because they didn't control what birth defects they had, they still need to be either locked up or sentenced to death. But vengeance for the sake of payback is very much pointless, whichever costs less is a much better criteria until we can "fix" those people.

'For the record, I still support the death penalty for military infractions, such as wartime treason, desertion, or cowardice' - idiot

How is a military infraction different from anything else?

The US military hasn't executed anyone since 1961, and in 1961 it was for rape and attempted murder.

Everyone sitting on the US military death row right now is there for murder or an inchoate crime related to murder.

I'd say that, in practice, the US military doesn't even agree with the death penalty for desertion or cowardice.

Yeah, execute a guy for going on a month long bender in rural North Carolina, but life in prison for a pedophile serial killer. The death penalty should only be used for first-degree murder and treason, and there should be automatic appeals.

There ARE automatic appeals, and first-degree murder doesn't mean the same thing in every state.

Nor should it. I meant that there should be automatic appeals in the case of treason too, which there may be. I don't know. I just think that capital punishment should only be an option in the absolute worst case, and even then there need to be a bunch of safeguards so that innocent people aren't executed unjustly.

@ Invictus

I said *wartime* desertion, treason, and cowardice.

And treason is the only crime that warrants the death penalty for civilians.

Which we haven't done since 1942, and we probably shouldn't have done it that time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_parte_Quirin

I heartily agree, Gunfighter. Franklin, Jefferson, Adams and the rest of that treasonous rabble should have been put out of their misery at the earliest opportunity. Death is too good for those scum who turn their backs on their own country.

@ Octavious

Haha. I see what you did there. I think that they were no longer guilty of treason when they succeeded.

I too recently changed my opinion on the death penalty.

Unfortunately I changed it for a very selfish reason. Imagine that a hostile political party came to power in your country, and they are about to make your normal activities a crime punishable by death. Would you want them to have the power to kill you? I would not, therefore, I do not support the government's right to kill anyone. I think we support the death penalty because we are almost certain it will never be carried out on us, and do not imagine a scenario in which it might.

The death penalty is uncivilised; more civilised nations end up with lower crime rates across a variety of measures.

Even with some mentally ill murderers...

I'd support the death penalty in very rare cases (such as the Aurora case from the outside looking in) if there weren't cases if it weren't for cases like Troy Davis and Anthony Graves. The death penalty is very unstable statistically in terms of exonerations of people that have been convicted of crimes someone else did. It's not as invincible a system as one might think. Yes, I support it in very rare cases, but not until they fix it up will I support it in its use today.

@Crazy A,

Your selfishness is just what is needed. If no person should have the right to kill another it can easily be extended to no collection of people should have this right, no matter what kind of majority elected them.

Whether dictator or democracy, communist or free marketeer, community or country.

Alas our rights are only guarenteed by the violence threatened by our militaries, and this even allows our military to assasinate (political motivated killing) our citizens.

Somehow this goes almost unnoticed.

I guess you're not american if you're not currently on american soil.

Re: wartime treason - so first the US starts another war (what generation of Americans hasn't had some enemy to fight since 1945?)

Second the government introduces a draft.

Thrid a million men refuse to serve...

What then? Can't make them soldier up... Can execute them if you've got the man/drone power.

I think it should be there, but used very rarely.

However, I volunteer for the firing squad for this Nobody in Colorado.

Well, that would be unconstitutional of course, orathaic. If they're going to ignore that, why wouldn't they ignore some other law too?

Anyway, I'm with Invictus. I support the death penalty because it is just. I think it is probably also a good deterrent, though the statistical argument about that is very messy and in-the-weeds, so I'll have to leave that as a gut instinct. (There are highly technical papers by both sides arguing back and forth).

@Gunfighter

Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason?
Why, if it prosper, none dare call it treason.

--Sir John Harington

"I said *wartime* desertion, treason, and cowardice.

And treason is the only crime that warrants the death penalty for civilians."


I suppose that, in the event that there is another total war of continental scope where millions of American soldiers are fighting an enemy of equal or near equal might then death for desertion may make sense, and the same with cowardice and treason. But since it was hardly used in WWII I can't imagine it ever really being justified in the modern age.

And a really big war is almost impossible anyway. One with Russia or China would escalate into a nuclear exchange long before we start naming beaches on their shores. One with Iran or in Pakistan would be "only" a massive bombing campaign if our leaders have any sense at all. If the situation in Venezuela gets dicey America would just use proxies along the lines of Colombia. Should Syria collapse Israel or Turkey would almost certainly spearhead any ground operations. And that's about it for countries which we could realistically have a serious war with. A soldier who deserts or breaks some other military code should be punished, but unless the Ruritanians are about to sack Washington there's no compelling reason it ought to be execution.