No intention of being childish, DS, nor of descending to abuse. I asked merely because it is clear from your links that you are something of a zealot on the matter. It is helpful to know precisely what kind of zealot one is dealing with in such cases. If a person's conviction springs from emotion, and the facts (pro or con) come later, then there is little use in attempting to employ reasoned argument - the person will be impervious. On the other hand, a person with a conviction which arises from reason is one who is open to argument. If I am dealing with the latter, I am more than happy to continue the discussion.

Ambo "Unless you can provide some methods that will assist Australia in eliminating the moral crime of state sanctioned murder, then I suggest you leave this forum to those who wish to discuss the topic. "

So Ambo, who died and left you as room monitor ?

IF you cannot handle an opposing view to your own I suggest you leave this forum.

I for one would welcome the introduction of the death penalty for drug dealing on the second offence - I will be liberal enough to allow anyone one change to rectify from their "mistake" but as things go I rate drug dealers worse than certified sociopaths and deserving no long to contaminate the air they breathe

Trinity I am more scared by
"We will never evolve as an intelligent species until we learn how to control and treat the perverse among us."

than by the idea of the perpetrators of extreme crime being executed. I'm not sure I trust our legal system (or that of our neighbours) to endorse either prospect.

The definition of "perverse" has a way of changing to suit those in power.

In the mean time we do need to find realistic means for ourselves and our neighboor to deal with the reality of individuals who willingly and repeatedly choose to harm others. Long term imprisonment - should other prisoners be subject to risk from someone who is already jailed for life? Should we or our neighbours keep the worst offenders in isolation (a welded shut cage maybe) to ensure they never hurt anybody else? Is execution worse than some of the alternatives?

Not many easy answers.

R0bert

No there are no easy answers RObert. However, after paying very close attention to this discussion it seems as though some who intend to impose their view are inclined to respond with an abundance of mathematical solutions to well researched, specific and complex questions regarding the killing of innocent people.

I hope we never see welded shut cages either. We don’t even do that to animals.

I think that many of us, who are not criminals, believe that we might prefer death over life in prison. This is understandable. But, for violent criminals, specifically capital murderers, that most certainly is not the case.

The pre trial, trial and death row evidence -  the survival effect

At every level of the criminal justice process, virtually all criminals do everything they can to lessen possible punishments.  I estimate that less than 1% of all convicted capital murderers request a death sentence in the punishment phase of their trial.  The apprehended criminals' desire for lesser punishments is overwhelming and unchallenged.

Of the 7300 inmates sentenced to death since 1973, 85, or 1.2% have waived remaining appeals and been executed. 98.8% have not waived appeals.  The evidence is overwhelming that murderers would rather live on death row than die.  Why?  The survival effect -- life is preferred over death and death is feared more than life.  Even on death row, that is the rule.

Even such marginalized personalities as capital murderers fear death more than imprisonment.  And that which we fear the most, deters the most. (kudos to Ernest van den Haag and many others)

It is logical to conclude that some of those less marginalized personalities, who choose not to murder, also, overwhelmingly, fear death more than life, and, we, thus, logically conclude that some are deterred from murdering because of the enhanced deterrent effect of execution.

The evidence for the survival effect in pretrial, trial and appeals is overwhelming and that weighs in favor of execution as a deterrent and as an enhanced deterrent over lesser sentences

Trinity "We will never evolve as an intelligent species until we learn how to control and treat the perverse among us."

In Stalins view - people who think like me are perverse and he did his utmost to eradicate us.

In my view socialism is a perversion - and should be controlled by having a vote for socialism being enough to cancel all future voting rights....

Your desire to "control and treat" is prejudical and judgemental in the extreme.

Try "accept", "tolerate" or "re-educate" - or you might find someone with power but different views considers you a suitable case for "controlling and treating".

My personal view is everyone has the right to be bad / perverse (to be defined) - but that they are held accountable for their actions is what brings down the consequences upon them.

We will only evolve by allowing everyone to be free to think and be as expressive as they want. We will stagnate if we try "controlling" them.