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Politics : 2000:The Make-or-Break Election -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Father Terrence who wrote (423)	7/18/2000 1:44:15 PM
From: jlallen	Respond to of 1013

No. I did not say that. JLA

To: Father Terrence who wrote (423)	7/18/2000 2:57:34 PM
From: jttmab	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 1013

Terrence, Perhaps you appreciate why this is one of the issues I don't "debate". Eventually, sooner rather than later, the debate descends to name calling, not to mention the exaggeration and hyperbole used by persons on both sides of the issue. It is probably more accurate to say that a debate never occurs; each side just shouts their position louder than the previous "speaker". I don't believe that most of the time, the participants even focus on the correct issues. IMHO, individual details of one case or another are not that relevant, it's the impact to society that is important. We can note that in most of the industrial world, the death penalty does not exist and is viewed as uncivilized. We can also observe in those countries that the homicide rate is much lower than in the United States. Seems difficult to argue then that the death penalty is an effective deterrent. If I could cite the name of one, two or five individuals that were wrongly executed would that change the opinion of any death penalty proponent. Most that I've talked to are willing to find that "an acceptable loss" in the name of justice. One should be able to determine statistically whether there is a direct [or inverse] correlation between the death penalty and homicide; if there was a direct correlation would that change the opinion of any significant number of people. I doubt it. Most people reject "fact" or deny seeing the significance when it is in disagreement with their deep seated opinions. A simple state of humanity. It was interesting lurking. Regards, jttmab P.S. Hamilton wrote a "letter to the editor" with regard to the suppression of the Whiskey Rebellion. The effect was to change the opinion of a large number of people who had supported the rebels and the government was overwhelmed with volunteers to suppress the rebellion and enforce the tax. Interesting read if you haven't seen it. The history of the change from the Articles to the Consitution is an interesting discussion in iteself. The attendees were sent to modify the Articles and not to write a Consitution. But as I understand it, the Articles were generally considered inadequate. An interesting aside is that Hamilton walked out on the Constitutional Convention, but later returned and Ben Franklin conned a number of attendees into signing the document under the premise that they were not agreeing to the contents but rather agreeing that it was the Consitution that the group agreed to put to the States. Lots of other trivia that I find interesting but won't bore the thread any further.