* Eye for Eye, Tooth for Tooth ...

U.S. Said to Seek Execution for 6 in Sept. 11 Case

by WILLIAM GLABERSON
Published: February 11, 2008

"Military prosecutors have decided to seek the death penalty for six Guantánamo detainees who are to be charged with central roles in the Sept. 11 terror attacks, government officials who have been briefed on the charges said Sunday."

Families of the victims of Sept. 11 have mixed reactions to the possible penalty by death:

"Relatives of the Sept. 11 victims have expressed differing views of potential death sentences, with some arguing that it would accomplish little other than martyring men for whom martyrdom may be viewed as a reward."

On the other hand, the sister of one of the victims said she would approve of an effort by prosecutors to seek the execution of men she blames for killing her brother “... such a case could help refocus the public’s attention on what she called the calculated brutality of the attacks, which she said has been largely forgotten." “My opinion is,” she said, “if the death of 3,000 people isn’t sufficient for a death penalty in this country, then why do we even have the death penalty?”

Why, indeed.

"Some countries have been critical of the United States’ use of the death penalty in civilian cases, and a request for execution in the military commission system would import much of that criticism to the already heated debates about the legitimacy of Guantánamo and the Bush administration’s legal approach there, some lawyers said."

"In any event, vigorous trial battles and appeals would probably mean that no execution would be imminent. “It certainly seems impossible to get this done by the end of the Bush administration,” Professor Glazier said."

Cross-reference METAXY for 'Death Penalty'

Forgive us our trespasses even as we fry our neighbors in the electric chair for trespassing against us.

*The Death Penalty

Forgive us our trespasses even as we fry our neighbors in the electric chair for trespassing against us.
~ Author unknown

* What's Wrong with This President?

On my mind today is Bush's upcoming speech on his "new" plan for Iraq. I am dreading what he might say, i.e., that more troops are needed. Today's New York Times headline and yesterday's are stealing my hope for a rational and compassionate plan for Iraq from him. The most crucial part of these articles, for me, is that, "Mr. Bush ... plans to send as many as 20,000 additional troops," which isn't really news of late.

There are probably a thousand articles which were written over the past several years about Bush's lack of intelligence, his combination of religious faith and arrogance, but maybe not as many about what I see as his frightening lack of compassion.

I remembered a perhaps under-reported incident in 1999 in a Tucker Carlson interview where Bush mocks death row inmate Karla Faye Tucker pleading for her life. Whether we agree with the death penalty, or not, Bush presented himself as a cold-hearted jerk.

Wikipedia: "In 1999, during the 2000 Republican Presidential primary race, Carlson interviewed then-Governor of Texas George W. Bush for Talk magazine. Carlson reported that Bush mocked soon-to-be-executed Texas death row inmate Karla Faye Tucker and "cursed like a sailor." Bush's communications director Karen Hughes publicly disputed this claim. Carlson did not vote in the 2004 election, citing his disgust with the Iraq war and his disillusionment with the once small-government Republican party."

From "Devil May Care" by Tucker Carlson, Talk Magazine, September 1999, p. 106, "Bush's brand of forthright tough-guy populism can be appealing, and it has played well in Texas. Yet occasionally there are flashes of meanness visible beneath it.

"While driving back from the speech later that day, Bush mentions Karla Faye Tucker, a double murderer who was executed in Texas last year. In the weeks before the execution, Bush says, Bianca Jagger and a number of other protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Tucker. 'Did you meet with any of them?' I ask.

"Bush whips around and stares at me. 'No, I didn't meet with any of them,' he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest, most offensive question ever posed. 'I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with [Tucker], though. He asked her real difficult questions, like 'What would you say to Governor Bush?'

'What was her answer?' I wonder.

'Please,' Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, 'don't kill me.'

"I must look shocked -- ridiculing the pleas of a condemned prisoner who has since been executed seems odd and cruel, even for someone as militantly anticrime as Bush -- because he immediately stops smirking.

'It's tough stuff,' Bush says, suddenly somber, 'but my job is to enforce the law.' As it turns out, the Larry King-Karla Faye Tucker exchange Bush recounted never took place, at least not on television. During her interview with King, however, Tucker did imply that Bush was succumbing to election-year pressure from pro-death penalty voters. Apparently Bush never forgot it. He has a long memory for slights." [Carlson, Talk Magazine, 9/99] Washington Monthly

The whole incident, and much more is recounted here in Death in Texas, including discussion of the "over 152 executions" that Bush presided over as governor:

Death in Texas
The New York Review of Books

January 13, 2005
by Sister Helen Prejean

An excerpt:

"Bush was receiving thousands of messages urging clemency for Tucker, including one from one of his daughters. "Born-again" evangelists such as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, normally ardent advocates of execution, urged him to commute Tucker's sentence. When Pope John Paul II urged Bush to grant mercy to Tucker, Bush responded disingenuously in a letter to the Pope, saying, "Ms. Tucker's sentence can only be commuted by the Governor if the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles recommends a commutation of sentence." On several occasions, Bush stated publicly that in deciding Karla Faye Tucker's fate, he was seeking "guidance through prayer," adding that "judgments about the heart and soul of an individual on death row are best left to a higher authority."

"But there was no way Bush could avoid the godlike power thrust on him as governor. When Russian president Vladimir Putin declared that life-or-death judgments should be "left to the Almighty," he meant that such supposed judgments, even if they are believed to be divine, cannot properly be discerned and administered by flawed human agents. This recognition led him to oppose government executions. But while Bush claimed to leave the judgment of Karla Faye Tucker to God, in reality he exercised his own political judgment and authorized her death."

I wonder what glee Bush expressed over Saddam Hussein's death.

METAXY War Casualties in Iraq,
US and Iraqi and,

$ Cost of War

* Leaving Islam: Apostates Speak Out

Edited by Ibn Warraq

"Defying the death penalty applicable to all apostates in Islam, the ex-Muslims who are here represented feel it is their duty to speak up against their former faith, to tell the truth about the fastest growing religion in the world. These former Muslims, from all parts of the Islamic world, recount how they slowly came to realize that the religion into which they were born was in many respects unbelievable and sometimes even dangerous. These memoirs of personal journeys to enlightenment and intellectual freedom make for moving reading and are a courageous signal to other ex-Muslims to come out of the closet."

... and all ex-believers.

* Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Universal Declaration of Human Rights: No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

1. Abolitionist for all crimes, countries whose laws do not provide for the death penalty for any crime:

ANDORRA, ANGOLA, ARMENIA, AUSTRALIA, AUSTRIA, AZERBAIJAN, BELGIUM, BHUTAN, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA, BULGARIA, CAMBODIA, CANADA, CAPE VERDE, COLOMBIA, COSTA RICA, COTE D'IVOIRE, CROATIA, CYPRUS, CZECH REPUBLIC, DENMARK, DJIBOUTI, DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, ECUADOR, ESTONIA, FINLAND, FRANCE, GEORGIA, GERMANY,GREECE, GUINEA-BISSAU, HAITI, HONDURAS, HUNGARY, ICELAND, IRELAND, ITALY, KIRIBATI, LIBERIA, LIECHTENSTEIN, LITHUANIA, LUXEMBOURG, MACEDONIA (former Yugoslav Republic), MALTA, MARSHALL ISLANDS, MAURITIUS, MEXICO, MICRONESIA (Federated States), MOLDOVA, MONACO, MONTENEGRO, MOZAMBIQUE, NAMIBIA, NEPAL, NETHERLANDS, NEW ZEALAND, NICARAGUA, NIUE, NORWAY, PALAU, PANAMA, PARAGUAY, PHILIPPINES, POLAND, PORTUGAL, ROMANIA, SAMOA, SAN MARINO, SAO TOME AND PRINCIPE, SENEGAL, SERBIA, SEYCHELLES, SLOVAK REPUBLIC, SLOVENIA, SOLOMON ISLANDS, SOUTH AFRICA, SPAIN, SWEDEN, SWITZERLAND, TIMOR-LESTE, TURKEY, TURKMENISTAN, TUVALU, UKRAINE, UNITED KINGDOM, URUGUAY, VANUATU, VATICAN CITY STATE, VENEZUELA

2. Abolitionist for ordinary crimes only, countries whose laws provide for the death penalty only for exceptional crimes such as crimes under military law or crimes committed in exceptional circumstances:

ALBANIA, ARGENTINA, BOLIVIA, BRAZIL, CHILE, COOK ISLANDS, EL SALVADOR, FIJI, ISRAEL, LATVIA, PERU

3. Abolitionist in practice, Countries which retain the death penalty for ordinary crimes such as murder but can be considered abolitionist in practice in that they have not executed anyone during the past 10 years and are believed to have a policy or established practice of not carrying out executions. The list also includes countries which have made an international commitment not to use the death penalty:

ALGERIA, BAHRAIN, BENIN, BRUNEI DARUSSALAM, BURKINA FASO, CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC, CONGO (Republic), GABON, GAMBIA, GHANA, GRENADA, KENYA, KYRGYZSTAN, MADAGASCAR, MALAWI, MALDIVES, MALI, MAURITANIA, MOROCCO, MYANMAR, NAURU, NIGER, PAPUA NEW GUINEA, RUSSIAN FEDERATION, SRI LANKA, SURINAME, SWAZILAND, TOGO, TONGA, TUNISIA

4. Retentionist, countries and territories which retain the death penalty for ordinary crimes:

AFGHANISTAN, ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA, BAHAMAS, BANGLADESH, BARBADOS, BELARUS, BELIZE, BOTSWANA, BURUNDI, CAMEROON, CHAD, CHINA, COMOROS, CONGO (Democratic Republic), CUBA, DOMINICA, EGYPT, EQUATORIAL GUINEA, ERITREA, ETHIOPIA, GUATEMALA, GUINEA, GUYANA, INDIA, INDONESIA, IRAN, IRAQ, JAMAICA, JAPAN, JORDAN, KAZAKSTAN, KOREA (North), KOREA (South), KUWAIT, LAOS, LEBANON, LESOTHO, LIBYA, MALAYSIA, MONGOLIA, NIGERIA, OMAN, PAKISTAN, PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY, QATAR, RWANDA, SAINT CHRISTOPHER & NEVIS, SAINT LUCIA, SAINT VINCENT & GRENADINES, SAUDI ARABIA, SIERRA LEONE, SINGAPORE, SOMALIA, SUDAN, SYRIA, TAIWAN, TAJIKISTAN, TANZANIA, THAILAND, TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO, UGANDA, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, UZBEKISTAN, VIET NAM, YEMEN, ZAMBIA, ZIMBABWE

Amnesty International

*

Note: At the end of this link "is a list of countries which have abolished the death penalty since 1976. It shows that in the past decade, an average of over three countries a year have abolished the death penalty in law or, having done so for ordinary offences, have gone on to abolish it for all offences."

* * *


Sentenced to Hang
Saddam Hussein was found guilty of crimes against humanity on Sunday, November 5, 2006, and sentenced to hang by the U.S.-sponsored court that has been trying him in Baghdad for the past year.

Saddam verdict, hailed by foes, upsets some Arabs

by Alistair Lyon


November 5, 2006

BEIRUT (Reuters) - "Saddam Hussein's death sentence on Sunday evoked satisfaction in countries he invaded, sorrow among his Palestinian admirers and resentment from some Arabs who see him as the victim of a U.S.-inspired show trial."

* * *

Sunday Herald/Scotland
November 5, 2006

Justice or Retribution?

With Saddam’s death the nightmare will continue … and worsen, "The bringing to justice of a hated tyrant should always be welcomed, but a death sentence here, while supposedly indicative of Iraq’s returned sovereignty, will do little other than create a martyr whose death inevitably will lead to a heightened sense of vengeance among his followers."

Justice and retribution would be a life sentence for Hussein.