So we kill someone to show that killing someone is wrong

[malthaussen]

30. I was just saying that our country's priorities are screwed up.

I remember video of the crowd going wild at the baseball game when bin-Laden's death was reported, chanting "USA! USA!" No matter that we were involved in two pointless wars, with thousands if not millions of innocent civilians being massacred in our name... the dirty low-down murdering "terrorist" was dead, so somehow that "proved" that we were Number One. As if there weren't (and aren't) about ten thousand other more important things to worry about.

I am slightly in favor of the DP on the grounds that it at least keeps the odd killer from ever killing again, but obviously our justice system is so fraught with deficiencies that it is a damned weak argument. As a "deterrent," the DP is obviously useless, and can easily lead to "as well hung for a sheep as a lamb" situations.

In my psychotic moments, I wish for a legal system where 1) One lawyer argues both sides of the case, and 2) penalties are assigned by the victim or his survivors. I'm not completely convinced that such a system would be materially worse than the one we have, even if at the same time we do have to accept that our system is better than nothing.

-- Mal