Whatever Wednesday

Death Penalty + More on Diversity

Since you asked

On TUE 8/14, Nebraska executive Carey Dean Moore for the capital crime of murder. This man had been on death row for almost 40 years. Here' my opinion about the death penalty.

• The Bible permits government to enforce a death penalty.
• The government is not obligated to carry out executions.
• It is hard to imagine that the death penalty serves as a deterrent, since many, many years elapse between the crime & execution.
• Courts typically issue multiple stays of execution.
• This strikes me as being cruel to the victims of capital crimes.
• On the other hand, multiple stays of execution demonstrate how careful the State must be in exercising its right to execute a convicted criminal.
• Lethal drugs do not ensure that a criminal can be executed humanely.
• Arguments against the death penalty can be persuasive, i.e., how some capital crimes result in sentences of death while others do not.
• Prosecutors should be able to use the threat of the death penalty to elicit cooperation from suspects.
• Despite arguments that any execution is inhumane, victims of murder were not "executed" in a humane manner.
• Actions carry consequences, & some crimes deserve forfeiture of life.
• There is NOT a moral imperative that those who oppose abortion should also oppose the death penalty.
• I am grateful that I, personally, am not entrusted with decisions regarding the life or death of anyone.

Diversity Part III

"Greater diversity means inevitably that we have less in common, & the more we encourage diversity the less we honor the common good. Any honest & clear-sighted observer should be able to see that diversity is a solvent that dissolves the unity & cohesiveness of a nation--& we should not be deceived into believing that its proponents do not understand the full impact of their advocacy!
          "Diversity, of course, marches under the banner of tolerance, but is a bastion of intolerance. It enforces its ideological liberalism with an iron fist that is driven by political correctness, the most ingenious (and insidious) device for suppressing freedom of speech & political dissent ever invented."
          From "Does Diversity Really Unite Us? Citizenship & Immigration," by Edward Erler, Imprimus, A Publication of Hillsdale College (July-Aug 2018):