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Utah lawmaker proposes bringing back firing squads for executions.

Logan 5

Regular Member
Joined
Apr 16, 2012
Messages
696
Location
Utah
The courts would quickly rule that "cruel & unusual"; how dare you take them out of their air conditioning and deprive them of their cable TV and actually make them do something.

One thing I have noticed about liberal leaning individuals is their total inability to recognize humor; did you fail to see :eek:

When was the last time you were in jail or prison?
 

OC for ME

Regular Member
Joined
Jan 6, 2010
Messages
12,452
Location
White Oak Plantation
If everybody was going about properly armed the instances of a dude needing killed by the state would be greatly reduced. Most LACs would likely remove the administrative burden associated with needing the state to do our killing for us. "Liberalize" SD laws so that our fellow lacks could bust-a-cap in BGs when the BG is doing his evil deed(s).

Oh, but wait...."we may not know the whole story"....."we may not have all of the facts".....well, that don't stop cops on the street, or the courts, from killing folks and we LACs should not be held to a higher standard than the state.

For or against, don't matter to me. You don't want to be put on death row, go to a state that don't have a death row. Not that death row is a deterrent.

The manner of killing is nothing but a distraction.
 

utbagpiper

Banned
Joined
Jul 5, 2006
Messages
4,061
Location
Utah
In real life I would prefer rehabilitating someone long before killing them. So many people in prison, wasting taxpayer dollars, that could be out working and contributing to the economy. Putting people in person for 10+ years is not rehabilitative, nor is it really punishment. It's stupid. $85,000/prisoner/year....?

Let us remember that prison serves several purposes.

Punishment, and presumably some deterrent against re-offending and to others who might otherwise be inclined to commit a similar act is one aspect.

Rehabilitation, helping or making a person fit to live in decent society is another aspect. In many cases, time itself will work wonders on this. For a host of reasons, most 40 years are far less prone to various kinds of crime than they were when they were 20. And by 60 very few folks have much interest or ability to commit most violent or property crimes. (Pedophilia is one stark exception.)

The third and very important reason to put people into prison is to protect society until such time as they are no longer a danger. Maybe this is just a restatement of "rehabilitation." But in any case, it is distinct from punishment. In fact, in many cases I'm far less concerned about imposing punishment than I am in protecting society. Leniency for the battered wife who finally snaps and kills her husband in his sleep is, to my way of thinking, based less on any notion that "maybe he had it coming" than on "she probably doesn't pose much risk to others."

In any event, in capital cases we are rarely talking about a choice between rehabilitation and execution. If we (as society, the jury, judge, etc) thought there was half a chance at rehabilitation we'd probably not be looking at capital punishment anyway. Generally the question is between life without possibility or parole or other release and execution. I intend to avoid ever being faced with such a choice, but I'm thinking once the possibility of exoneration and release is gone (or effectively gone), that a quick and humane execution is probably no worse than and maybe much preferred over living live 23 hours a day in high security solitary confinement.

Finally, as we consider the cost of incarceration or any other punishment be sure to weigh it against the cost of not imposing punishment, not discouraging future crime, not protecting society from a convicted criminal. One death from a DUI car crash or any other violent crime can result in a couple of million dollars in lifetime lost income, or easily more than that in lifetime medical costs if the victim survives but is severely disabled. Not to mention intangible or difficult to compute costs like the increased risk of poverty or criminality among kids raised without both parents, loss of companionship, etc. A single small smash and grab at my home some years back cost me upwards of $500 plus the value of my time by the time I replaced a busted garage pedestrian door and several hand tools that were taken. My guess is that it supported someone's drug habit for all of about one day. Even if some "petty thief" only does something similar 2 or 3 times a week, you're looking at $65,000 in property damage and losses. Four times a week puts an annual total damages north of $100k. Plus the intangibles of the sense of violation. A few years later someone tried to kick in my front door, I presume to grab my flat panel TV, while we were out for an hour. My extra-long screws in the strike plate and hinges held. But the door and jam had to be replaced. Ever priced even a modest but half way secure front entry door? Failure to punish crime, to protect society from known, convicted criminals, costs a lot too. It just doesn't show up on government budgets quite so clearly.

Charles
 

Gil223

Regular Member
Joined
Jan 5, 2012
Messages
1,392
Location
Weber County Utah
You're right. It's just sick humor.

In real life I would prefer rehabilitating someone long before killing them. So many people in prison, wasting taxpayer dollars, that could be out working and contributing to the economy. Putting people in person for 10+ years is not rehabilitative, nor is it really punishment. It's stupid. $85,000/prisoner/year....?
The word working against "rehabilitation", and keeping our prisons full, is "recidivism". Some folks seem to go out of their way to prove the adage that, "Ya can't fix STUPID". Pax...
 

Primus

Regular Member
Joined
Oct 24, 2013
Messages
3,939
Location
United States
Let us remember that prison serves several purposes.

Punishment, and presumably some deterrent against re-offending and to others who might otherwise be inclined to commit a similar act is one aspect.

Rehabilitation, helping or making a person fit to live in decent society is another aspect. In many cases, time itself will work wonders on this. For a host of reasons, most 40 years are far less prone to various kinds of crime than they were when they were 20. And by 60 very few folks have much interest or ability to commit most violent or property crimes. (Pedophilia is one stark exception.)

The third and very important reason to put people into prison is to protect society until such time as they are no longer a danger. Maybe this is just a restatement of "rehabilitation." But in any case, it is distinct from punishment. In fact, in many cases I'm far less concerned about imposing punishment than I am in protecting society. Leniency for the battered wife who finally snaps and kills her husband in his sleep is, to my way of thinking, based less on any notion that "maybe he had it coming" than on "she probably doesn't pose much risk to others."

In any event, in capital cases we are rarely talking about a choice between rehabilitation and execution. If we (as society, the jury, judge, etc) thought there was half a chance at rehabilitation we'd probably not be looking at capital punishment anyway. Generally the question is between life without possibility or parole or other release and execution. I intend to avoid ever being faced with such a choice, but I'm thinking once the possibility of exoneration and release is gone (or effectively gone), that a quick and humane execution is probably no worse than and maybe much preferred over living live 23 hours a day in high security solitary confinement.

Finally, as we consider the cost of incarceration or any other punishment be sure to weigh it against the cost of not imposing punishment, not discouraging future crime, not protecting society from a convicted criminal. One death from a DUI car crash or any other violent crime can result in a couple of million dollars in lifetime lost income, or easily more than that in lifetime medical costs if the victim survives but is severely disabled. Not to mention intangible or difficult to compute costs like the increased risk of poverty or criminality among kids raised without both parents, loss of companionship, etc. A single small smash and grab at my home some years back cost me upwards of $500 plus the value of my time by the time I replaced a busted garage pedestrian door and several hand tools that were taken. My guess is that it supported someone's drug habit for all of about one day. Even if some "petty thief" only does something similar 2 or 3 times a week, you're looking at $65,000 in property damage and losses. Four times a week puts an annual total damages north of $100k. Plus the intangibles of the sense of violation. A few years later someone tried to kick in my front door, I presume to grab my flat panel TV, while we were out for an hour. My extra-long screws in the strike plate and hinges held. But the door and jam had to be replaced. Ever priced even a modest but half way secure front entry door? Failure to punish crime, to protect society from known, convicted criminals, costs a lot too. It just doesn't show up on government budgets quite so clearly.

Charles

Well said.+1

Sent from my XT907 using Tapatalk
 

utbagpiper

Banned
Joined
Jul 5, 2006
Messages
4,061
Location
Utah
I used to be a proponent of the death penalty, until I realized how utterly fcuked and fallible our "justice" system is.

Regardless of whether someone deserves execution; it's not a power I want resting in the hands of a corrupt, unaccountable entity like the government.

I alluded to this in my prior post, but thought I'd be a bit more explicit.

The real power entrusted to government is the power to imprison. Whether government leaves you to rot in prison for 40 years before dying, or humanely executes you after 10 years is not much of a difference in my mind.

The problem is not with wrongful executions. The problem is with wrongful convictions. What punishment is imposed after a wrongful conviction is just a matter of degrees. And in any capital case, it isn't like the choice is between execution or a slap on the wrist.

While a man might be exonerated after decades in prison and released, it isn't like we can restore his lost years to him, or remove whatever extra-judicial brutalities he suffered while in prison. Indeed, we might question how much interest would be paid to exonerating men who are "only" sentenced to some long prison term.

If we want to avoid wrongful execution, we need to avoid wrongful conviction. And that requires a solid return--individually and collectively--to the lodestone principle of our justice system that "it is better for 10 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly convicted." That means we really have to accept that sometimes, perhaps fairly often, criminals will not be convicted. We have to accept that OJ first trial, Josh Powell never even being indicted, George Zimmerman being acquitted, and the Rodney King cops getting acquitted are part of the price we pay to live in a free society. In some of these cases, maybe we believe the defendant/suspect really was innocent. But in every case there are large groups absolutely convinced the subject was guilty and should have been convicted and punished. How we react when we sincerely believe the subject is guilty is a measure of how firmly we oppose unjust punishment of the innocent.

Admittedly, for me, it is easier to accept lack of conviction in cases involving private citizens than in cases where the crime came at the hands of a government agent. But that is probably a topic for another day.

Charles
 
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