Van Dam

**epeemike81** · 08-28-2002 05:48 AM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Inquartata:
I do not see any contradiction. It is wrong to cause avoidable harm to others; it is right to refrain from such acts. Where is the logical flaw there?<hr /></blockquote>The logical flaw comes when you support causing avoidable harm to others (i.e. the death penalty)

<blockquote>quote:<hr />I might also say that all it takes is for the government to spare ONE guilty person so that he can kill again to demonstrate the injustice of government procedures.<hr /></blockquote>And all it takes is to find ONE innocent man on death row to show the injustice of the death penalty. I don't know if you remember, but in Illinois (I believe, though it may have been a different midwest state), the government challenged an anti death penalty advocate to find one innocent man on death row. He and the college class he taught found well more than that, and proved it! It led to the state indefinitely ceasing the death penalty, due to the clear problems with this system.
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Injustice as a function of human fallibility is unavoidable in either case. I would rather err on the side of protecting society, myself.<hr /></blockquote>But true life in prison DOES protect society as a whole! In addition, that is a sentence which can be terminated. yes injustice is possible with either penalty. the difference is that the stakes are MUCH higher with the death penalty.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />No---at best it serves the function I mentioned way back in my first post ( I think ): it removes the criminal permanently from society. It removes his genes from the gene pool ( in case criminal violence has a hereditary component )<hr /></blockquote>maybe we should execute drug users. after all, if there is a hereditary predisposition to addiction.....
<blockquote>quote:<hr />It does serve the purpose of retribution, as well, true, but that is not its sole benefit.<hr /></blockquote>just out of curiosity, are you religious? if so, which one? I am not, but I am always fascinated with the irony that the religious right is pro death penalty, given the teachings of the book that they proport to live their life by.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />As matters stand. That is my point ( one of them, anyway ). Only as matters currently stand...<hr /></blockquote>but your solution is to allow the execution of innocent people through misuse in the name of getting 'em all!

-m

**epeemike81** · 08-28-2002 06:09 AM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Inquartata:
Precisely the same state of affairs applies to sentences of imprisonment. How does this militate against capital punishment? Surely you do not propose we discard the justice system because it is prone to occasional error and abuse? One must have some method of dealing with aberrant behaviour, and to paraphrase Churchill the method we use is probably "The worst there is, except for all the others"...<hr /></blockquote>First of all, see my prior point about raising the stakes. no, I can't give him the last twenty years of his life, but the next twenty is still twenty more than a wrongly executed person can get back. Secondly, if it were occasional error, I might be able to see a strange sort of fairness to it, at least. It is not. it is, as you have acknowledged, systematic error which biases itself against lower classes and minorities. Is this true of imprisonment also? of course! however, as I said, the stakes are higher with the death penalty. why would you be willing to allow a system which makes as many mistakes as you acknowledge this one making to do something as permanent as death?

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Let us be candid: concern for the sanctity of international law was not the reason for the furor over that case. It was merely a plausible excuse for attempting to press the superiority of the Mexican legal system and ethos toward capital punishment onto another nation with a different ethos. Mexico, like most other nations, believes the death penalty to be wrong, and instead of protesting its use here or simply admitting that other states are entitled to differ in their approaches---and that a person who commits a crime is subject to the laws of the jurisdiction in which it occurs, not of his home country---it tried to find a convenient "niggling detail" to obtain the outcome it wanted. No different from the way we behave when our citizens are arrested in other countries, and no more admirable.<hr /></blockquote>yes, they WERE protesting that the death penalty is wrong. the fact that they were using international law to do that is irrelevant to the fact that we should abide by international laws, even when "niggling". You keep justifying the government's right to take life as the price we pay for being members of this society. well, in the international community, execution is seen as a human rights violation. where is our membership in that community? So, here is a question for you: what has Sadaam Hussein done which we object to? he has
a) invaded a foreign nation. So have we!
b) Executed his on citizents. So do we!

now, mind you, I am not arguing that Hussein hasn't done things which are heinously wrong, just that we are being VERY hypocritical about it.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Gad, now THERE's a leap---from the occasional regrettable ( and regretted ) mistake which results in the execution of an innocent to wholesale deliberate genocide, all in one paragraph!

Do you really believe that the present system of capital punishment leads inevitably to ethnic cleansing and the concentration camps?

Wow...

You know, I'm afraid this debate is devolving from calm and lucid arguments into personal bickering to no purpose....and absorbing a lot of our time doing so. In the end it comes down to conflicting beliefs, about which neither of us are going to convince the other. So perhaps we ought to let it rest, before outright animosities begin to creep in...<hr /></blockquote>it is not that big a leap. I am not saying we are there, just that this is how it started in other countries. A system with a systematic bias which could execute people.

Also, in this day and age, with Ashcroft proposing that public and private employees who visit your house in the course of their work should spy on you (You know, the TIPS program... The Inevitable Police State), the justice department fighting to keep their prosecutions secret, and widespread profiling of muslim americans, I think we should try to keep the governments powers as narrow as practical.

-m

[ 08-28-2002, 09:14 AM: Message edited by: epeemike81 ]

**Gav** · 08-28-2002 07:19 AM

Sorry folks I am at work and didn't have time to read all of the posts since I last looked in. If I trample on anyones toes sorry.

Ok, when was the Death Penalty abolished in the United Kingdom?

1965 according to Amnesty International:
<a href="http://www.amnesty.org.uk/action/camp/dp/intro/uk.html" target="_blank">Final Steps to Abolition</a>

This applies to murder and sundry criminal offences although the UK still carried the DP til 1998 for some serious militairy offences. The likelyhood of these being enacted was extremely low in any case. Interestingly (and I cannot find a resource to back me up on this) it's a common folk tale in Scotland that you can still be beheaded for stealing sheep. This law hasn't been enacted for a couple of centuries and should be considered defunct...

Some general information from the uk government:
<a href="http://travel.state.gov/uk.html" target="_blank">useful info</a> no stats alas, but it will give you a feel for what the UK's like. I've vetted it and there aren't any glaring inonsistencies. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

I see we're drifting towards the pro and anti gun lobby in some of the posts. The media in
Great Britain portray gun and violent cime as having reached epidemic levels. In fact this is not entirely correct. There are areas of Britain which suffer from relatively high levels of crime (inner cirt London and Mosside in Manchester spring to mind) however these areas represent the bad eggs and are areas where extreme poverty and drug related crime are rife. The vast majority of Britain is quite calm and settled with only very minor crime in evidence.

Why? Well I doubt that we killed off the 'criminal element' by utilising Capital Punishment. Don't forget that there were other avenues available to the judiciary of the time to deal with violent crime, some were exported to the colonies - draw your own conclusions. Please note that I do not include Northern Ireland as the circumstances there are special. The answer is quite complex and I'm not sure I could give a decent reason without spending more time on research. I would like to think that it's because there is a long history of teaching respect to our kids. But I'm not sure - I'll get back to you IF I get the time to look up the doc's.

**epeemike81** · 08-28-2002 07:19 AM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Inquartata:
"According to figures released by London [ how serendipitous! ] police, muggings involving a firearm have risen by 53%, from 453 during the six months ending November 2000 to 667 during the same period in 2001. The number of homicides with a gun in London jumped by 90% during the same time, from 16 to 30. that's a far cry from the 640 murders many[ my emphasis---not all, you note ] gun-related, in New York alone last year, but that figure is way down from the peak of 2,262 in 1992. Street crime in Britain's capital has also skyrocketed in recent months, with 19,248 robberies reported between September and November 2001, up more than 100%...Handguns were outlawed in 1997..."<hr /></blockquote>gee, when the economy tanked and people became more desperate the crime rate went up??? shocking! Seriously, though, this is an unimportant statistic, in the way that you are using it. The fact that crime rose from 2000 to 2001 is not only two small a sample size to show a trend, but is not a meaningful comparison since both were after handguns were outlawed. also, as you note, the violent crime rates are still significantly lower than American cities which have less gun control. This seems to run contrary to your thesis.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Meanwhile--again from my past research, numbers from memory only at this point---Switzerland, with nearly universal gun possession among militia-age adult households, is as close to zero crime involving firearms as it is possible to get in this world.<hr /></blockquote>This is comparing apples and oranges. you are comparing a very wealth resort country to crime rates in cities, which have a greater degree of poverty. Again, not meaningful. Do you honestly believe that Switzerland would be a hotbed of crime if there were stringent gun control?? I don't think so.
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Take out political violence and the same can be said of Israel.<hr /></blockquote>again, societal homogeneity (in this case, two societies, but homogeneity within each). "take out political violence", and you are left with Jew on Jew crime and Palestinian on Palestinian crime. Obviously, this is fairly low.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Meanwhile in thailand, where ALL private gun ownership is prohibited and harshly punished, and again AFTER removing politically-motivated violence, the per capita muder rate, last time I checked, was approximately seven times that of the US.<hr /></blockquote>yeah, Thailand has a lot of problems. again, these are apples and oranges. The US is a much richer country than Thailand. the best comparisons are, as you have pointed out, of generally similar situations. for example: London v. Large American Cities.

 <blockquote>quote:<hr />The number of crimes reported in Japan [ another gun-free nation ] rose to a record high during the first six months of the year...The number of crimes reported...climbed 15.9% from the same period in 2000...while the arrest rate slipped to 19% from 25.3%, according to the study. Only...0.7% of the total, were classified as serious crimes. that figure was up 23.3% from the first half of 2000, with armed robberies accounting for much of the jump.<hr /></blockquote>See my objections to your London example.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />When a feud between villagers here and a neighboring community turned violent, people didn't turn to police but took matters into their own hands. The villagers made [ ! } guns. Gun ownership is virtually banned in China, but the country is awash in firearms. Last year, police seized 1.34 million...Between 1995 and 2000, robberies nearly doubled. Hundreds of villages make guns for profit and protection. Some weapons are smuggled in...;others are made by rogue military factories, stolen from police or sold by security forces on the black market.<hr /></blockquote>See my Thailand objection.
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Clearly, stringent gun control laws don't seem to be working all that well in quelling crime and violence...<hr /></blockquote>your stats very clearly fail to show this.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />More tomorrow, if you like.<hr /></blockquote>I would. and here is what I would like: per capita rates of crime increase for England and the US for the time period in question.

thanks.

-m

**Gav** · 08-28-2002 07:21 AM

BTW England is NOT interchangeable with UK. UK residents citizens tend to find this habit annoying in the extreme.

**JEC** · 08-28-2002 08:02 AM

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> BTW England is NOT interchangeable with UK. UK residents citizens tend to find this habit annoying in the extreme. <hr /></blockquote>In the same tone, America (or for that matter North America) and USA are not interchangeable. Unfortunately, it will take a lot of geography lessons to correct it. Thus, choose your battles, this one is a lost cause.

**Gav** · 08-28-2002 08:21 AM

JEC Correct me if I'm wrong but:

America = The American bits of North America
USA = all of the bits that make up the USA (all the states, protectorates (?) etc)
North America = America and Canada
THE America's = North and South America

However England is a sperate entity within the United Kingdom. Stating that England IS the UK is like saying Texas is the USA. In addition reffering to all residents of the UK as English would also be like saying that all residents of the USA are Texans. I try to get my geography right and if I'm wrong
feel free to criticise me. I don't mind - honest. It's just that it's truly irritating to constantly hear people refer to UK citizens as English and the UK as England when that is not true. We don't even necessarily speak the same language...

**epeemike81** · 08-28-2002 08:29 AM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Gav:
JEC Correct me if I'm wrong but:

America = The American bits of North America
USA = all of the bits that make up the USA (all the states, protectorates (?) etc)
North America = America and Canada
THE America's = North and South America

However England is a sperate entity within the United Kingdom. Stating that England IS the UK is like saying Texas is the USA. In addition reffering to all residents of the UK as English would also be like saying that all residents of the USA are Texans. I try to get my geography right and if I'm wrong
feel free to criticise me. I don't mind - honest. It's just that it's truly irritating to constantly hear people refer to UK citizens as English and the UK as England when that is not true. We don't even necessarily speak the same language...<hr /></blockquote>I think that JEC's point was that technically, America refers to the continent, not the USA, much as Europe refers to the continent, not the EU.

As for using England and UK interchangeably, I am not. What originally brought this issue to the fore was the Mencken quote, which refers to England. I have, thus, kept it in those terms, and have NOT brought the UK as a whole into it.

And I get the point about referring to all UK residents as English... Lord knows I don't want to be referred to as Texan!!!!

-m
-m

[ 08-28-2002, 11:33 AM: Message edited by: epeemike81 ]

**edew** · 08-28-2002 01:52 PM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Inquartata:
 <blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by edew:
[qb]Inquartata, you speak of believing in right and wrong, and then you say you speak based on logic. The two cannot go together. If you have any sense of logic, then you must wash yourself of any belief or conviction on universal right and wrong, of any sort of "absolute" morality. Any little amount of study into the concept will clearly show that moral absolutism is inherently illogical.<hr /></blockquote>I do not see any contradiction. It is wrong to cause avoidable harm to others; it is right to refrain from such acts. Where is the logical flaw there? To kill for personal pleasure or momentary expediency is wrong---and it has always been so, in every society. Where is the "moral relativism" in that? <hr /></blockquote>If you think that simplistic, then I'm sure you have another think coming. Just consider how often "momentary expediency" has been invoked to knock off someone. And sometimes, for the good of the local community and society, it was the right thing to do.

Frexample, in "To Kill A Mockingbird", the denouement was the "momentary expedient" killing of an all-around bad guy. That the sheriff "concluded" that the guy "accidentally" killed himself was to hide the truth of Boo Radley doing the killing. That's moral relativism right there. When innocent Afghans are killed by US troops as "collateral damage" that's momentary expediency. Some people seem to accept such expediency.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />
<blockquote>quote:<hr />That said, all it takes to show the injustice of government procedures is ONE innocent person sent to prison. It's not enough that we say, "ok, one Diallo for one Corlli (or whoever it was you wrote down).<hr /></blockquote>I might also say that all it takes is for the government to spare ONE guilty person so that he can kill again to demonstrate the injustice of government procedures. <hr /></blockquote>Nope. A guilty person spared, only to do it again is an indication of that person's callous disregard for life. There's been many cases of drunk drivers who have killed, and then let back on the road to kill again. Too bad. That guy ought to do something about. But the government shouldn't be executing such lowlifes.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />
Injustice as a function of human fallibility is unavoidable in either case. I would rather err on the side of protecting society, myself.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Punishing the murderer with capital punishment does not undo the act. At best, it's venting<hr /></blockquote>No---at best it serves the function I mentioned way back in my first post ( I think ): it removes the criminal permanently from society. It removes his genes from the gene pool ( in case criminal violence has a hereditary component ), and it prevents him from twisting or teaching others with whom he is thrown together ( in case it is all experiental ). It does serve the purpose of retribution, as well, true, but that is not its sole benefit. <hr /></blockquote>There's less draconian ways to remove the criminal permanently from society. His genes has nothing to do with it. Prior to his "alleged" killing of Nicole Brown and Ronald Goldman, OJ Simpson's genes were highly prized. Should we now kill his son and daughter because YOU think that criminal violence is hereditary?

Retribution is hardly a "benefit". More like a sad characterization of humanity.

**oiuyt** · 08-28-2002 02:33 PM

Mike- you keep asking for numbers. So far Inq has povided some that came to hand and has promised to provide more. As he pointed out discussions like this frequently degenerate into complaints about the source of the numbers and then about their interpretation (that said, you merely complained about his interpretations which is reasonable). I think you need to put up some numbers as well, give him a shot at taking down YOUR interpretations....

Inq- drop the genetic angle from your arguments, you're much more convincing without it. So far nothing has come up to support the thesis that the genes of murderers are a primary cause. It's MUCH more likely that things such as upbringing, early experience, societal position etc. would overwhelm whatever influences genetics have on likelihood to commit murder.

We have epeemike and EDew both espousing anti-DP positions, EDew bringing in many more general libertarian issues, epeemike sticking (mostly) to the primary issues (in this thread) of the DP and gun control, most notably historical observations thereof.

We have Inquartata taking the pro-DP, pro-gun stance. Inq actually HAS cited numbers and has been bringing up various historical arguments.

Both sides on occasion are getting wound up in their arguments and, at times, fail to see well-reasoned points by the opposition. Epeemike and Inq, while supporting antithetical positions, are both doing a fairly good job of having a reasonable and interesting exchange.

EDew- how do you feel about gun control? I don't remember you weighing in on that portion of the discussion at all (I might have missed something, there's a LOT of text above here in the thread...

). Presumably you're with Inq in that the government shouldn't limit personal rights with regard to gun ownership?

-B

**Inquartata** · 08-28-2002 08:44 PM

Oh, very well, once more into the breach, if you insist. But it really isn't very fair of you to make me spend half the night posting replies to dozens of posts---and me with my laborious one-finger typing!

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by epeemike81:
The logical flaw comes when you support causing avoidable harm to others (i.e. the death penalty)<hr /></blockquote>The position I mentioned was greatly simplified, of course, in the interest of brevity. We can delve into John Locke and Hobbes and John Stuart Mills if you like,and discuss social contract theory and utility calculus and all that philosophical twaddle if you like. But to state it a bit better, it is good to cause avoidable harm to other without necessary and sufficient reason. There are circumstances which override any position---to have shot Hitler in 1939 would have been to cause avoidable harm to another, too, but this would have been justified ( IMO )in the name of the greater good, ie saving millions of other lives thereby. Capital punishment is similarly justified on the grounds I've previously mentioned: deterrence ( I find that it does occasionally work, there is at least one instance of a serial killer deliberately avoiding the state of Texas because he believed---wrongly, as it happened---that it had the death penalty ), retribution, economy, and protection. Any and all of which are of course arguable.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />And all it takes is to find ONE innocent man on death row to show the injustice of the death penalty. <hr /></blockquote>Which was precisely what Eric said, to which I replied as previously. And round and round we go... <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

I still come down on the side of the theory of the greater good, though. The state kills one innocent man---injustice. The state in effect arranges, by its overnice scruples, for a guilty man to be allowed to kill two others---greater injustice. A simple equation, for me. Save as many lives as possible.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />But true life in prison DOES protect society as a whole! In addition, that is a sentence which can be terminated. yes injustice is possible with either penalty. the difference is that the stakes are MUCH higher with the death penalty.[quote]

The problem ( well, one of 'em ) is that true life sentences are vanishingly close to nonexistant. The most draconian of sentences that judges can hand down are all too often overridden by legislated sentencing guidelines and by parole boards. These simply do NOT protect society as well, as long, or as surely as death.

[quote]maybe we should execute drug users. after all, if there is a hereditary predisposition to addiction.....<hr /></blockquote>A red herring, mike. Drug use is primarily a victimless crime, and certainly not a capital crime. Moreover, the genetics of addiction are much different than those of aberrant behavior, if the latter exist.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />just out of curiosity, are you religious? if so, which one? I am not, but I am always fascinated with the irony that the religious right is pro death penalty, given the teachings of the book that they proport to live their life by.<hr /></blockquote>No, I am agnostic.

If you are referring to the Bible, though, I guess it depends on which testament is emphasized...or which teachings. Just as the Koran can be interpreted either peaceably or violently, depending on emphasis...

<blockquote>quote:<hr />but your solution is to allow the execution of innocent people through misuse in the name of getting 'em all!

-m<hr /></blockquote>I know that if were my choice upon being convicted of a capital offense while innocent, I would prefer to say "game over, start again" than to spend fifty years in a concrete box with brutal guards and worse fellow inmates...

However, this is as good a place as any for me to eat some of my own words. Pass the salt, please.

I hope that no one reading this has a heart attack from the shock of someone actually admitting that they have been wrong about something---it's almost never done, in my experience, especially on issues like this one, where both camps are emotionally invested---but intellectual honesty constrains me to do so.

I find upon closer examination that, however attractive Mencken's assertion may have been philosophically, he was talking through his hat fact-wise. Which sort of robs his idea of its logical force.

He said that the death penalty has not worked in the US because it has never been applied widely enough, whereas in England it had been and had had a beneficial effect. This latter seems not to have been the case.

Now, in all fairness to him, his error was probably not deliberate. Gathering and compiling good statistical data much earlier than the turn of the last century is problematic at best; indeed the very word "statistic" goes back only to 1880. So I genuflect briefly in the direction of those difficulties and admit that he may not have had any numbers to go on. But in researching the matter I found this, in the Encyclopedia Americana entry on capital punishment:

"As late as 1819, according to one estimate, English law provided the death penalty for over 220 crimes, including such minor ones as shoplifting articles valued above 5 shillings, cutting down trees along an avenue or in a park, and shooting a rabbit. Although the laws were not strictly enforced, courts handed down between 2,000 and 3,000 death sentences a year from 1805 to 1810. The severity of the law, however, was considerably mitigated by the frequent refusal of judges or juries to convict, by the quashing of indictments on a technicality, by the arbitrary fixing of the value of stolen articles at less than that required for a capital crime, by royal pardon, and by benefit of clergy. As a result...by the 1800s executions apparently never exceeded 70 a year, even though all felonies carried a mandatory death sentence."[emphases added]

In other words, England has never "really tried" capital punishment, either.

True, it was used earlier, as imprisonment did not really become an option until relatively late in European history. But clearly a method so sparingly used could not have resulted in the salutory effect Mencken admired, that of lowering the criminal population.

So while I remain convinced that a determined use of the penalty WOULD have such an effect on future crimne rates, it cannot be empirically proven, as Mencken suggested. I yield the point on those grounds.

[ 08-28-2002, 11:51 PM: Message edited by: Inquartata ]

**135711** · 08-28-2002 08:48 PM

so while you guys are getting off on yourself, another kid was kidnapped.

**Catlady** · 08-28-2002 09:33 PM

This time by his own dad. To get temporarily off subject--of course I never do that right? <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> -- for those of you freaking out about the recent spate of kidnappings is that this pattern i.e. kidnapping as related to a custody dispute, is more common than the feared--random psycho kidnaps and tortures child who is a complete, or nearly complete stranger.

[ 08-29-2002, 12:35 AM: Message edited by: Catlady ]

**Inquartata** · 08-28-2002 09:39 PM

Sigh...my poor finger! I begin to feel like Mickey Rooney's character in "Evil Roy Slade"...

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by epeemike81:
First of all, see my prior point about raising the stakes. no, I can't give him the last twenty years of his life, but the next twenty is still twenty more than a wrongly executed person can get back. <hr /></blockquote>Again, I side with Timothy McVeigh here: better to just accept a quick death rather than half a century or more in a dingy cell with rabid sociopaths as both guards and fellow inmates. All the more so if one is innocent. If I were one of these twenty-year fellows freed on DNA evidence I'd hate the system with every fiber of my being and would probably go looking for ways to get back at it. Not what you want, I think.

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> Secondly, if it were occasional error, I might be able to see a strange sort of fairness to it, at least. It is not. it is, as you have acknowledged, systematic error which biases itself against lower classes and minorities. <hr /></blockquote>I think it is less a bias against minorities per se than against the poor, of which minorities make up a disproportionate number. But even so, why is it better to make the occasional mistake and kill an innocent man just because he isn't a minority? Even if the sentencings and executions were perfectly balanced along demographic lines I would see no difference. That the occasional mistake will fall more heavily on minority groups because they are more prevalently so convicted does not seem to me more tragic, in other words. An innocent death is an innocent death.

Moreover, there are paradoxes in the statistics. For instance, from the same encyclopedia article i quoted before, the stats showed that of all inmates executed between 1930 and 1972, 53.5% were black, 45.4% white, and 1.1% other races. Less than 1% were women, but of the women executed 62.5% were white and 37.5% black and other races, the opposite skew. Meanwhile men receive, on average, sentences 46% longer than women who commit the exact same crimes. Should we now protest that male inmates are being discriminated against and therefore we must stop imprisoning people because the system results in systemic bias?

<blockquote>quote:<hr />yes, they WERE protesting that the death penalty is wrong. the fact that they were using international law to do that is irrelevant to the fact that we should abide by international laws, even when "niggling". <hr /></blockquote>It was an excuse to attempt to force their own NATIONAL laws on another sovereign nation. They consider their beliefs re capital punishment superior to ours and would attempt to force us to their way of thinking, by hook or crook, even if only in one case and even when the crime was in our country. If we passed a law saying that no American arrested in Mexico could be imprisoned or fined, would we expect Mexico to abide by our wishes? Would using niggling details of international diplomatic rules to get our way in that respect be admirable? I think not...

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> You keep justifying the government's right to take life as the price we pay for being members of this society. well, in the international community, execution is seen as a human rights violation. where is our membership in that community? <hr /></blockquote>When nation states surrender their sovereignty to an international government, this will become an excellent point. We are not yet so far advanced. My passport does not say "Citizen of International Community", it says "Citizen of the US of A". That means I must follow American law here, Mexican law down south, and English law in Britain. And vice versa. One day it may be different. But until then we must deal with things as they are.

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> So, here is a question for you: what has Sadaam Hussein done which we object to? he has
a) invaded a foreign nation. So have we!
b) Executed his on citizents. So do we!<hr /></blockquote>Surely you are not suggesting there is no difference?

We have invaded foreign powers---but only when provoked or attacked by them. Saddam merely decided he wanted to expand Iraq, concocted a theory that Kuwait was rightfully part of Iraq, invaded and raped it. Not unlike Hitler with the Sudetenland. And we know what THAT led to.

We have executed our own citizens, but only after due process of law. We have not murdered them in their homes, and their entire extended families with them, in order to breed fear of crossing the regime. And we have not done so wholesale, using weapons of war, without cause other than disagreement with a dictator.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />it is not that big a leap. I am not saying we are there, just that this is how it started in other countries. A system with a systematic bias which could execute people.<hr /></blockquote>Which other countries?

We seem to have gotten along for over two hundred years with capital punishment in varying forms and degrees with out moving noticeably in the direcxtion of genocide. I don't see it as a danger in a stable democracy. Autocracies are another matter entirely, of course.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Also, in this day and age, with Ashcroft proposing that public and private employees who visit your house in the course of their work should spy on you (You know, the TIPS program... The Inevitable Police State), the justice department fighting to keep their prosecutions secret, and widespread profiling of muslim americans, I think we should try to keep the governments powers as narrow as practical.
<hr /></blockquote>On that account I agree ( though on a minor point of information I believe that the TIPS program has in fact met with the death penalty in the Senate ). But I think that there are many worse dangers to liberty, and many more alarming government powers, than that of capital punishment. After all, it would surprise me if we, a nation of 260 odd million souls, have executed more than 5,000 people since the Civil War---a vanishingly miniscule percentage...

[ 08-29-2002, 12:41 AM: Message edited by: Inquartata ]

**Inquartata** · 08-28-2002 09:55 PM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Gav:
The media in
Great Britain portray gun and violent cime as having reached epidemic levels. In fact this is not entirely correct. There are areas of Britain which suffer from relatively high levels of crime (inner cirt London and Mosside in Manchester spring to mind) however these areas represent the bad eggs and are areas where extreme poverty and drug related crime are rife. The vast majority of Britain is quite calm and settled with only very minor crime in evidence.<hr /></blockquote>Thanks for the info, Gav. I thought it had happened in the fifties sometime---my ancient encyclopedia ( c. 1975 ) still lists several European nations as having the death penalty, at least for certain high offenses. That included Greece, Russia and even France.

As to media portrayals, it's no different here, really. The killings and such make better news, and the constant reporting of it leads people to fear that the Huns are rampaging everywhere. When in fact unless you live in certain inner cities and are associated with drugs or gangs one is likelier to be hit by lightning than a bullet. The death rate from firearm use---about five per 100,000 of population---is exactly the same as the death rate for women on oral contraceptives: five per 100,000.

The point I was making was that in England, where strict gun control is the rule, crimes with firearms are on the rise, whereas in the US they have actually been declining over the same period. ( Note in the article I cited, too, the subtle biases or errors---only London figures are given for the UK, but for the US the numbers for New York are "only one city of many". Last I heard there were other cities in the UK, too. And figures for London are all gun-involved, while for New York only "many" are, meaning they are counting crimes where no gun was used, apparently. )

Yes, the wonderful Fourth Estate...

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Why? Well I doubt that we killed off the 'criminal element' by utilising Capital Punishment. Don't forget that there were other avenues available to the judiciary of the time to deal with violent crime, some were exported to the colonies - draw your own conclusions. <hr /></blockquote>See my mea culpa in my first reply to epeemike of today, above. Apparently Mencken drew unwarranted conclusions about the extent of the death penalty in England during the period he cited. It pretty much invalidates the causal relationship he posited.

**epeemike81** · 08-28-2002 09:57 PM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by oiuyt:
Mike- you keep asking for numbers. So far Inq has povided some that came to hand and has promised to provide more. As he pointed out discussions like this frequently degenerate into complaints about the source of the numbers and then about their interpretation (that said, you merely complained about his interpretations which is reasonable). I think you need to put up some numbers as well, give him a shot at taking down YOUR interpretations....

Inq- drop the genetic angle from your arguments, you're much more convincing without it. So far nothing has come up to support the thesis that the genes of murderers are a primary cause. It's MUCH more likely that things such as upbringing, early experience, societal position etc. would overwhelm whatever influences genetics have on likelihood to commit murder.

We have epeemike and EDew both espousing anti-DP positions, EDew bringing in many more general libertarian issues, epeemike sticking (mostly) to the primary issues (in this thread) of the DP and gun control, most notably historical observations thereof.

We have Inquartata taking the pro-DP, pro-gun stance. Inq actually HAS cited numbers and has been bringing up various historical arguments.

Both sides on occasion are getting wound up in their arguments and, at times, fail to see well-reasoned points by the opposition. Epeemike and Inq, while supporting antithetical positions, are both doing a fairly good job of having a reasonable and interesting exchange.

EDew- how do you feel about gun control? I don't remember you weighing in on that portion of the discussion at all (I might have missed something, there's a LOT of text above here in the thread...

). Presumably you're with Inq in that the government shouldn't limit personal rights with regard to gun ownership?

-B

<hr /></blockquote>oiuyt, how do YOU feel about these issues?

-m

**epeemike81** · 08-28-2002 10:44 PM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Inquartata:
Again, I side with Timothy McVeigh here: better to just accept a quick death rather than half a century or more in a dingy cell with rabid sociopaths as both guards and fellow inmates.<hr /></blockquote>which is preferrable is not the issue on this board.
<blockquote>quote:<hr />If I were one of these twenty-year fellows freed on DNA evidence I'd hate the system with every fiber of my being and would probably go looking for ways to get back at it. Not what you want, I think.<hr /></blockquote>So, your new argument is that we should kill them quickly lest they be proven innocent and be jaded and pissed off?
<blockquote>quote:<hr />I think it is less a bias against minorities per se than against the poor, of which minorities make up a disproportionate number. But even so, why is it better to make the occasional mistake and kill an innocent man just because he isn't a minority? Even if the sentencings and executions were perfectly balanced along demographic lines I would see no difference. That the occasional mistake will fall more heavily on minority groups because they are more prevalently so convicted does not seem to me more tragic, in other words. An innocent death is an innocent death.

Moreover, there are paradoxes in the statistics. For instance, from the same encyclopedia article i quoted before, the stats showed that of all inmates executed between 1930 and 1972, 53.5% were black, 45.4% white, and 1.1% other races. Less than 1% were women, but of the women executed 62.5% were white and 37.5% black and other races, the opposite skew. Meanwhile men receive, on average, sentences 46% longer than women who commit the exact same crimes. Should we now protest that male inmates are being discriminated against and therefore we must stop imprisoning people because the system results in systemic bias?<hr /></blockquote>Agreed that on individual innocent cases, it is just as heinous if non-minority. however, my point was that when you have a systematic bias it makes it far too simple for the system to be misused. see below for more on this.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />It was an excuse to attempt to force their own NATIONAL laws on another sovereign nation. They consider their beliefs re capital punishment superior to ours and would attempt to force us to their way of thinking, by hook or crook, even if only in one case and even when the crime was in our country. If we passed a law saying that no American arrested in Mexico could be imprisoned or fined, would we expect Mexico to abide by our wishes? Would using niggling details of international diplomatic rules to get our way in that respect be admirable? I think not...<hr /></blockquote>We recently threatened to cut off aid to Egypt because they imprisoned somebody we didn't think they should. clearly, this sis less serious than executing somebody. So, as you can see, we DO diplomatically nickel and dime other nations. many people in this country HAVE seen that as "Admirable".
<blockquote>quote:<hr />When nation states surrender their sovereignty to an international government, this will become an excellent point. We are not yet so far advanced. My passport does not say "Citizen of International Community", it says "Citizen of the US of A". That means I must follow American law here, Mexican law down south, and English law in Britain. And vice versa. One day it may be different. But until then we must deal with things as they are.<hr /></blockquote>But the nation IS a member of the international community (UN, for example). Don't you see a problem with the double standards that exist? see below for more on this.
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Surely you are not suggesting there is no difference?

We have invaded foreign powers---but only when provoked or attacked by them. Saddam merely decided he wanted to expand Iraq, concocted a theory that Kuwait was rightfully part of Iraq, invaded and raped it. Not unlike Hitler with the Sudetenland. And we know what THAT led to.<hr /></blockquote>can you say Vietnam? how did they provoke us? how about the countless governments we replaced around the world, but especially in Latin America? we interferred in their internal politics and installed dictators who committed MUCH more heinous human rights violations than anything Hussein has even considered. It should be noted that these dictators, who showed remarkably similar behavior in their persecution fo their populations, had one thing in common: They were all trained at the School of the Americas, a training school which the US runs for Latin American governments.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />We have executed our own citizens, but only after due process of law.<hr /></blockquote>So did he. you may not agree with how successful that due process is at determining guilt, but then again, one of my major objections to executions in this country is the fallibility of the system.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />we have not murdered them in their homes, and their entire extended families with them, in order to breed fear of crossing the regime. And we have not done so wholesale, using weapons of war, without cause other than disagreement with a dictator.<hr /></blockquote>Murdered them in their homes? Ruby Ridge. And their extended families? Waco. using weapons of war? At waco we used tanks, at Kent state, the national guard fired on a crowd of demonstrators.

I agree, btw, that Hussein's government is far worse than ours, and many others (obviously), but there IS a double standard, and we are a lot more comparable than you seem to think.

btw, it should be noted that WE originally backed Hussein. just like we originally backed the Taliban and Manuel Noriega (sp??). In fact, I'm not sure we have fought an enemy we didn't create since Vietnam....
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Which other countries?<hr /></blockquote>Bosnia, for one. Frequently, massacres were justified by trumped up charges. In Somalia, the "courts" were biased against tribes other than the ruling tribe.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />We seem to have gotten along for over two hundred years with capital punishment in varying forms and degrees with out moving noticeably in the direcxtion of genocide.<hr /></blockquote>Remember: My statements were in response to your suggestion that we "streamline" the appeals proccess. to lessen the number of appeals in a proccess which already has systematic bias is taking one more step down that slippery slope.

-m

[ 08-29-2002, 01:53 AM: Message edited by: epeemike81 ]

**Inquartata** · 08-28-2002 10:51 PM

Waugh! Mike, buddy, you're killing me! I can actually FEEL the arthritis seeping into my typing finger...

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by epeemike81:
gee, when the economy tanked and people became more desperate the crime rate went up??? shocking! <hr /></blockquote>Point is that crimes involving outlawed guns were rising by leaps and bounds in the UK at a time when in the US rates of violent crime were actually declining modestly across the board. And that bad economy was just as much in evidence in the US, so that is no explanatory factor...

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> The fact that crime rose from 2000 to 2001 is not only two small a sample size to show a trend, but is not a meaningful comparison since both were after handguns were outlawed. <hr /></blockquote>This is why I hesitated to get into this debate. You ask for numbers, I give them to you, and you dismiss them as meaningless. One can do this with any statistic. There is always some flaw to be pointed to and cited as the reason why they don't say what the other fellow says they say. And vice versa. "The Devil can cite Scripture for his purpose"---and massage the data---and brother, most people on either side of this issue think of the other side as in league with the Devil...

Gun control has become a battlefield in a war between opposing armies in a cultural Holy War. Those on both sides have lost any capacity for compromise or admitting they are wrong. Both, in the words of one author, "posses a blinding sense of righteousness, a compelling desire to save people from themselves, a need to validate their beliefs by imposing then on others and an abiding faith that they can cure social ills by passing more laws." ( In this respect they resemble the antagonists on the death penalty and abortion. And even those of us not yet far gone in this fanaticism fall into the same behavior patterns---because we use as "experts" those who ARE immersed in their respective crusades. )

Another funny thing he points out, which seems right on the mark, is this one:

"A unique feature...of the gun control controversy is the way it causes partisans to change political character. The antigun people, who tend to be politically liberal and morally permissive, turn into law-and-order authoritarians, while progun people, generally conservative and moralistic, blossom into champions of civil liberties and individual rights."

I hope we are not going to fall prey to these sorts of tendencies. If so, I am out of here instanter...

So, not to put too fine a point on it---maybe you should just tell me what sort of statistics you would find acceptable and convincing, exactly, so that I don't waste both our time...

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> also, as you note, the violent crime rates are still significantly lower than American cities which have less gun control. This seems to run contrary to your thesis.<hr /></blockquote>I do not contend that things are otherwise---merely that if it were true as you said that "gun control makes societies safer" we would expect crime to be falling wherever gun control is adopted and rising or stable elsewhere. Clearly this is not the case. ( We are of course ignoring for the nonce the enormous differences in countries and the influences on them, which probably account for vastly more of the differences in crime rates than the presence or absence of firearms ).

Certainly crime per capita is higher here. However, if you look within countries you find that cities with strict gun control laws, such as Chicago and New York, have and have long had much higher crime rates than cities with few or none, such as Phoenix or Dallas.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />This is comparing apples and oranges. you are comparing a very wealth resort country to crime rates in cities, which have a greater degree of poverty. <hr /></blockquote>Of course. But just what comparison would you suggest would be apples and apples? No two nations are sufficiently alike in geography, population density and homogeneity, topography, size, wealth distribution, history, language, religion, and political system to allow true comparison. This doesn't stop the gun control advocates from bringing up differing crime rates between the US and whatever country they think makes their cherished point the best, however---so why should it stop you or me?

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> Do you honestly believe that Switzerland would be a hotbed of crime if there were stringent gun control?? /quote]

No. But then, I also don't believe that America would be a Utopia of peace and serenity if there were strict gun control. Or that England or Japan would dissolve in crime and civil war if there were no gun control there...

[quote]take out political violence", and you are left with Jew on Jew crime and Palestinian on Palestinian crime. <hr /></blockquote>And nonpolitical Jew-Palestinian, Palestinian-Jew crime. Also, there is a good-sized immigrant population to be accounted for. Yet the nonpolitical crime rate is very low despite ( or because of? ) the omnipresence of weapons in civilian hands.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />yeah, Thailand has a lot of problems. again, these are apples and oranges. The US is a much richer country than Thailand. the best comparisons are, as you have pointed out, of generally similar situations. for example: London v. Large American Cities. <hr /></blockquote>Yeah, it isn't too instructive to compare Third World nations to the industrialized Western ones, or Asian ones to Western ones---too many extraneous factors to be held constant. Way too complex. I was just tossing it out to show the perils of attempting to reduce enormously complex problems to simple equations like less guns=less violence ( or in the words of Lott's book "More Guns, Less Crime". The problem is just too involved to yield to easy fixes...

<blockquote>quote:<hr />your stats very clearly fail to show this.<hr /></blockquote>How so?

If crime is rising despite gun control laws, does it not then follow that the laws are ineffective?

<blockquote>quote:<hr />here is what I would like: per capita rates of crime increase for England and the US for the time period in question.<hr /></blockquote>I'll see what I can do. Which period do you mean? You said above that 2000-2001 wasn't relevant, so...

It · 08-28-2002 11:00 PM

Wow, I never thought that this thread would have such a profound effect on some of you. When I started this thread it was because of the anger and the relief I felt of the day of the verdict of Westerfield. To rehash, Westerfield was found guilty of Kidnapping and Murdering Daniel Van Dam, a 7 year old girl. I thought that some of you who might've followed this case would like to express your feeliings about the case. Or if not this case maybe another case that you'd want to vent with. But ot my surprise ------> (ya Right) it went to a totally different place. Well here's another story and your opinion counts.

I don't remeber the names of the girls concerning this case. But it got nation wide attention. This happened about a month and a 1/2 ago. Two girls (16 + 17) were kidnapped and raped. By a man in a white Bronco. An Amber alert was issused and the car was found with the perp and the two girls. The perp was shoot on the spot. By a Los Angeles Sheriff deputy. He was shoot in self defense. The officers in the case said the the girls were only minutes away from being killed themselves if it were for the Amber alert and the quick response of Law Enforcement. Now for the catcher. The perp had a list of criminal records. At the perp's house in his backyard, they found two bodies, so far, of missing teens. Now if he was alive what would've happened? If he wasn't shoot to death what could've happened? And my question again would be what should or could've been done if he were alive?

Now dosen't this anger you?

By the way an Amber Alert (named after a child) is, when a person is kidnapped or lost, an all bulletin braodcast is issued on the radio, T.V., and on freeway cal-trans traffic signs.

**epeemike81** · 08-28-2002 11:22 PM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Inquartata:
I do not contend that things are otherwise---merely that if it were true as you said that "gun control makes societies safer" we would expect crime to be falling wherever gun control is adopted and rising or stable elsewhere. Clearly this is not the case.<hr /></blockquote>no, we would not expect crime rates to be falling in societies with gun control and rising in those without it, but rather would expect crime rates to be lower in societies with gun control. Clearly, this IS the case.
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Certainly crime per capita is higher here. However, if you look within countries you find that cities with strict gun control laws, such as Chicago and New York, have and have long had much higher crime rates than cities with few or none, such as Phoenix or Dallas.
<hr /></blockquote>first of all, strict gun controls in cities don't work due to straw buying. For there to be a noticable effect, it must be enacted in a controlled environment (i.e. nationwide). We CAN see examples of nationwide gun control working, as noted above. Also, you have a chicken and egg problem here: Cities like Phoenix and Dallas are low crime, and thus would never discuss gun control. NYC enacted gun control as part of an attempt to curtail high crime rates.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Of course. But just what comparison would you suggest would be apples and apples? No two nations are sufficiently alike in geography, population density and homogeneity, topography, size, wealth distribution, history, language, religion, and political system to allow true comparison. This doesn't stop the gun control advocates from bringing up differing crime rates between the US and whatever country they think makes their cherished point the best, however---so why should it stop you or me?<hr /></blockquote>
I have already suggested an apt comparison: the rate of change of England's crime rate v. the rate of change of the world's crime rate. that comparison would answer one simple question: Does England's system work better than most? Also, given that England has, as you note, a lower per capita crime rate than the US, we can draw the conclusion that England's system as a whole works better than ours. This does NOT prove, unfortunately, that gun control is responsible, which gets back to your point that we can argue about reasons indefinitely.
<blockquote>quote:<hr />No. But then, I also don't believe that America would be a Utopia of peace and serenity if there were strict gun control. Or that England or Japan would dissolve in crime and civil war if there were no gun control there...

Yeah, it isn't too instructive to compare Third World nations to the industrialized Western ones, or Asian ones to Western ones---too many extraneous factors to be held constant. Way too complex. I was just tossing it out to show the perils of attempting to reduce enormously complex problems to simple equations like less guns=less violence ( or in the words of Lott's book "More Guns, Less Crime". The problem is just too involved to yield to easy fixes...<hr /></blockquote>A friend of mine pointed out another interesting fact about Switzerland: They have amazing social programs which all citizens are entitled to. it is virtually impossible to be down and out in Switzerland. I think that we should declare Switzerland as out of bounds in this discussion as it is in all other conflicts.

<blockquote>quote:<hr /> <blockquote>quote:<hr />your stats very clearly fail to show this.<hr /></blockquote>How so?<hr /></blockquote>what do you mean, how so? you acknowledged at each turn that your statistics concerning England, Thailand, Switzerland were NOT germaine to this argument. Thus, they fail to show your point.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />If crime is rising despite gun control laws, does it not then follow that the laws are ineffective?<hr /></blockquote>again, no it doesn't. the issue is the RATE OF CHANGE and how it compares to relatively similar nations RATES OF CHANGE over the same time period.

<blockquote>quote:<hr />here is what I would like: per capita rates of crime increase for England and the US for the time period in question.<hr /></blockquote>I'll see what I can do. Which period do you mean? You said above that 2000-2001 wasn't relevant, so...[/QB][/QUOTE]

[ 08-29-2002, 02:23 AM: Message edited by: epeemike81 ]

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