Today is one of those days where I have a ton to say, so this may be rather long.
Most people know that I am against the death penalty. I find fault in the way we use the death penalty in this country. Many people believe that the death penalty should be used for the following reason:
1.) Eye for an eye
2.) To deter future offenders
3.) Money
I don't believe that any of those reason advocate the use of death compared to that of a life in confinement. First of all, "eye for an eye" is not kosher with me. Person A kills person B. Thus, as a form of punishment, person C kills person A for the homicide of person B. So, who kills person C? For "eye for an eye" to be true, person B would have to kill person A, person C is nothing but a third wheel to the incident. Inevitably, the questions becomes, does C have the right to make two wrongs a right? In other words, does C have the right to kill A? To me, having person A in confinement for life, would be more of a punishment, because A would have to live a life in shackles with isolation of their freedoms being the punishment. Besides, God will give A the final punishment when He's ready.
The death penalty does not deter future offenders. A criminal never thinks they will be caught when committing a crime. That's also why so many criminals make "messy" mistakes.
It costs more to execute an inmate than to house an inmate for life without parole. I can't remember the exact figures, but I know that it costs approximately $2 million per execution compared to approximately $800K that it would cost for 40 years at the most highly guarded prison.
There's a lot more to the death penalty that I don't like, but I thought I would just take 3 ideas and focus on those.
When The Life of David Gale came out on video, best-guy-friend-from-college made me watch it. The first thing he asked me is if I believed in the death penalty. And, admittedly, I was iffy at the time. I watched the movie and became a HUGE anti death penalty advocate. Regardless of your ideas, it's a great movie to make you think about capital punishment.
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My 15-year-old brother, Little Donkey, totally pissed me off today. He berated me for going back to school and for not having enough money to be out on my own right this moment. Hello?! I did not have the luxuries that he has now when I was growing up. We didn't have a lot of money because my parents had a lot of bills. I never had any clothes that was name brand, nor did I have any brand name shoes that weren't on the Cat-and-Dog Day sales. (My first pair of Nike's were for $25 and came out the year before.) At the age of 10 I started to get my own money by mowing lawns and babysitting. From age 12 on, I bought most of my clothes and shoes. At age 16 I was working 30 hours a week at a convenience store to earn money, plus babysitting. I did all of this because if I wanted to be a cheerleader or go out, I had to provide my own means.
LITTLE DONKEY does none of this. I take that back, he half-assidly mows lawns in the summer, but mainly my parents end up mowing for him. Yet, he takes the money. That money is almost gone--so now he's constantly asking for money from the parents. If they don't give it to him, he throws a hissy fit. He goes to the movies about once a week-getting money from the parents--and he goes out with his buddies to eat after games, etc. He also owns a lot of brand name clothes, shoes, etc. He claims he buys most of it, but since I've been home this summer I've noticed that the parents buy man items, not all but many, because he's always broke. Little Donkey also has no idea how much I'm actually contributing to the household in how much work I've done and how much food I've given them. He doesn't cook or clean; I do. What really pissed me off was what happened Sunday when I was talking with Brandi. My ma was gone and we were supposed to find our own lunch. At noon I was still talking to Brandi and LD freaked out on me because it was noon and he thought it was time for food. I told him to go and make some of his own. He REFUSED to and yelled at me until I made him food. I made him tuna because he doesn't like fish.
Don't get me wrong, I love my brother, in fact I love my whole family, but I felt that his berating of me was out of line. Wow, that feels good to get off my chest!
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For the record, I sent out Christmas cards. If you don't get one by the 18th, let me know.
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I'm going to register for classes tomorrow at my graduate school!!! YAY!
3 comments:
And Christmas comes but once a year...and when it comes it brings good cheer!
The reason the death penalty costs so much is actually because of the number of appeals the person sentenced to death is given. In some states (let's use Texas as the example) there are less appeals (as my uncle says "The Express Check out lane") and it costs less. However, since this was brought on by the Scott Peterson Trial, his appeal process, unless he chooses to forego it, will cost a ton of money because he is in California. If I were him, although I believe he is guilty and I do believe in the death penalty, I would appeal because there were SO many technical aspects of that trial that were not exactly correct that he has a very good shot at having it overturned.
I have a feeling we'll be hearing from him for a long, long time.
What I find the most creepy about all of this is the fact that he's getting fan mail. HELLO?! What are people thinking these days?
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