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Democrats unveil legislation to end the federal death penalty


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In an exclusive interview with NPR, Sen. Dick Durbin and Rep. Ayanna Pressley discuss their push to end capital punishment at the federal level as their party takes full control of Congress.

 

 

Excellent news. Probably will require killing the filibuster to pass it, though.

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Just now, SoberChef said:

I consider myself moderate left but I am all about the death penalty, always have been, and truly wish we would go further with it.

 

Also, Carlin was spot on!

 

 

Philosophically, I am pro-death penalty. I believe there are some crimes that can be committed that deserve the permanent removal of that person from this plane of existence.

 

However, I am not a believer in the infallibility of our justice system. We fuck up a lot. You can always let someone out of prison, say "our bad, here's a million dollars" and be on your way. You can't reverse death. And one innocent person dying for a crime they didn't commit is one too many.

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There’s really no good reason to have the death penalty over life imprisonment, in the 21st century. People argue about the costs of capital punishment vs. decades of food and clothing, but none of that would even matter if our justice system wasn’t filling prisons to the brim.

 

And “philosophically” I find the reaction of most people to heinous crimes to be driven entirely by emotion rather than reason.

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9 minutes ago, SoberChef said:

I consider myself moderate left but I am all about the death penalty, always have been, and truly wish we would go further with it.

 

Do you acknowledge the problems with the justice system that BLM is protesting? If you do then I don't see how you can reconcile that with a chubby for the death penalty.

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11 minutes ago, Uaarkson said:

There’s really no good reason to have the death penalty over life imprisonment, in the 21st century. People argue about the costs of capital punishment vs. decades of food and clothing, but none of that would even matter if our justice system wasn’t filling prisons to the brim.

 

And “philosophically” I find the reaction of most people to heinous crimes to be driven entirely by emotion rather than reason.

 

The death penalty is actually MORE EXPENSIVE than life in prison, and doesn't deter crime as much as life in prison does. 

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11 minutes ago, Uaarkson said:

 

 

And “philosophically” I find the reaction of most people to heinous crimes to be driven entirely by emotion rather than reason.

I don't think so. I think there are certain crimes that display a level of psychopathy and selfish behavior that cannot possibly be corrected. These people should be removed from society permanently, and the most efficient way (at least it SHOULD be) is by death. It's entirely logical, I don't have a boner for punishment like a lot of people do.

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6 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

I don't think so. I think there are certain crimes that display a level of psychopathy and selfish behavior that cannot possibly be corrected. These people should be removed from society permanently, and the most efficient way (at least it SHOULD be) is by death. It's entirely logical, I don't have a boner for punishment like a lot of people do.


yeah but here’s the problem with that ‘logic’, death penalty is actually not at all efficient. imprisonment costs less.

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Just now, Uaarkson said:


yeah but here’s the problem with that ‘logic’, death penalty is actually not at all efficient 

That's why I said I'm only philosophically pro-death penalty. In real life, it's not efficient. And the more efficient it gets, the more prone to error it tends to be.

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Just now, SoberChef said:

Did you kill someone, multiple people perhaps? Did you maliciously rape/torture an individual? Guess what, that's irredeemable in my eyes and you're not fit to operate with the rest of society.

 

And with life in prison without the possibility of parole, that person will never operate with the rest of society.

 

Those are edge cases that are so very rare that they're not even worth considering when it comes to justifying the existence of the death penalty.

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While I agree some cases are so heinous that I think that person shouldn't be able to breathe air anymore, the reality is, capital punishment is really flawed in this country and there's really no good reason for it to continue, so I've been in favor of abolition for a long time. 

 

Won't happen for a long long time, though. 

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18 minutes ago, SoberChef said:

Did you kill someone, multiple people perhaps? Did you maliciously rape/torture an individual? Guess what, that's irredeemable in my eyes and you're not fit to operate with the rest of society.

 

Did you get falsely accused and convicted of those crimes? Well tough shit I guess. 

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2 minutes ago, SoberChef said:

Did you kill someone, multiple people perhaps? Did you maliciously rape/torture an individual? Guess what, that's irredeemable in my eyes and you're not fit to operate with the rest of society.

 

Here's the problem, and I went to school for this shit so I spent plenty of time reading all about this.

 

Severity of punishment has comparatively little impact on rates of crime.  More lenient states don't have significantly more crime than stricter states.  I am a terrible student of history, and even I can tell you that the punishment for crimes in earlier times was significantly more barbaric than it is today, and guess what?  Crimes still happened.  In parts of the world, the punishment for theft is losing an arm, shit still gets stolen.  You could design the breathalyzer to be the barrel of a gun that goes off if you blow over the limit, and drunk driving would still happen.

 

Essentially in criminal psychology, a "sane" person committing a crime weighs out a handful of factors.  The benefit to them of crime, the likelihood of being punished, and the consequences.  By far, the likelihood of being punished is the determining factor.  It outweighs severity of punishment by several magnitudes, which makes total sense.  Who cares what the penalty is if you're absolutely positive you won't be caught and face justice?  At the same time, if the penalty for a rolling stop was five dollars and a post it note that said "I'm really sorry" written on it, I'm still not going to intentionally do it right in front of a cop.  

 

Typically capital crimes are by far the worst candidates for the death sentence for these same reasons.  People who murder fall under three categories; people who don't/can't think of the consequence because they're insane or acting out of rage, people who have planned in advance and believe they won't be caught, or people who don't give two shits if they get caught.  No punishment will ever stop these people because they either don't care or don't think it will come to that.  No one carefully plans out a murder and is comfortable with life in prison but throws the whole thing in the trash because of the death penalty.  The same applies to rapists, torturers, kidnappers, child molesters, whatever.  If any of these people actually thought that they'd get caught, they wouldn't have done it in the first place, regardless of it being a long jail term or execution.

 

So if the death penalty prevents no crime, then all we're doing is killing people for revenge.  That's not a good reason for the state to take someone's life.  Even if we remove the costs involved with appeals and the legal process, even if it was still more cost effective and expedient to kill someone, it's still not a compelling argument to do it.  Once someone is in jail for life, they're essentially no longer a threat and there's no good reason to kill them.

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Im not fully passionate one way or the other. That being said, if the people most important to me are harmed or taken I would be filled with enough hatred to kill..

 

My biggest “frustration” with a life sentence or a really long sentence is that you are essentially taking that life... whatever potential that individual had at age 20 when the crime is committed is over by the time that person is 70, in a sense its a wasted life. Granted said person might reform and maybe use their regret to mentor or set someone on a better path.... but i dont know if it would balance against their crime

 

what about those whose crime is beyond horrible and unequivocally guilty? what life should they have if theres no potential for reform? If its “insanity” or other mental malfunction why not put them down? its a wasted life with no potential for reform? In a sense it sounds heartless... but I doubt I’d show any clemency even if said person was an immediate family member or friend.

 

Its a tossup for me... I cant claim high ground as there are horrible folks whose indifference towards the suffering they cause others makes me wish misery upon them.

 

Euthanasia is another scratcher i get flustered with

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