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re:off-topic



Cousins,
    It seems that I will be a minority on this one, but that is a
position I find familiar.
We (society) were wrong when we killed Timothy McVeigh. We did to him
exactly what he did to others, we killed him in cold blood.  This is
murder, plain and simple, and in some ways it is a more horrific crime
than the one perpetrated by McVeigh in that we (society) formulated a
plan, wrote this plan down so we can do it again(!) and then we killed
him.  We killed him to show that killing people is wrong.
    Cousins, when will we catch a clue that the death penalty is not
justice but simple revenge?  What we do in killing these criminals is
the same as hitting our children to show them that hitting is wrong.
Should we also then steal from our children to show them that stealing
is wrong? Should we then rape a rapist or beat a violent criminal? Does
this make any sense? Does it?
    If we REALLY wanted to punish McVeigh for this heinous crime, I feel
that life in prison without any media attention, no interviews, no
quotes, no attention for the rest of his bloody life would have been a
more effective punishment. It would have meant banishment for him. He
would have lived and died in obscurity. Surely this is a greater
vengeance than killing.
    The bottom line is this; do we as a society want justice or do we
want revenge?

--
There's nae man sae deif as he tha' winna hear.


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