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Cocktails & Barbedwire Fences
Posted: Friday, June 18, 2010 by LePhilozophe in Labels: death penalty, firing squad, lethal injection, murder, Ronnie Lee Gardner
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i've got mixed feelings about the death penalty. It's an uncomfortable topic to talk about- one of those you don't bring up at a dinner party, right along with religion, politics and the real reasons behind Uncle Bubba's showing up in a D&G evening gown with matching snake skin handbag and Jimmy Choo heels at the family reunion last spring. It's one of those topics (not the Choo heels, the death penalty i mean) that there's really no right answer to, and equally one of those it seems awkward to have an on-the-fence opinion on.Almost as awkward as it does not to.
Today i hear a convicted killer, one Ronnie Lee Gardner (why do the famous killers always have treble-syllabic names?), 49, was executed in Utah, US.He'd been on death row the past couple of decades for killing a lawyer on his failed escape attempt from a court house, where he was already facing charges over another murder- that of a barman. Not a particularly special case, not even considering his request for his preferred mode of execution-that of death by firing squad. Apparently he'd made this request before this particular mode of execution was banned in the state.
Now, see, this is where the awkwardness creeps in, for me. "Death by firing squad" is banned in the state of Utah, in favour of the lethal injection- much like all US states where the death penalty is in use (35, as of October 2009). Only Oklahoma still offers the firing squad as an alternative, and i doubt very much that this will be the case in a few months' time. Now, why do you suppose this is? Cutting costs by saving on bullets? Hardly likely. Try: a more humane way to die.
That's right. You committed a heinous crime in the denouement of which you happened to extinguish two human lives, thus we're going to punish you in the most severe way afforded to us by our high positions of authority as bearers of the sword of justice...and smite away yours too. Only...um... in a more respectable...uh... humane and... er...merciful way. Instead of shooting you to death, we're gonna inject you with a lethal cocktail of poisons. It'll kill you softly, y'see? You won't (you shouldn't) feel a thing. You should be thanking us, y'know. We're doing more for you than you ever did for your victims.
i dunno bout you lot, but this fence feels like it's getting wobblier by the minute. Funny, the vultures seem to be keeping their balance pretty well...
