Fight Fire with Fire

It's 4:40 AM on the east coast as I sit watching CNN andFox News. I stayed up to see if Stanley "Tookie" Williams would be granted clemency by the "governator" in light of the possibility of new witnesses. The stay was not granted and the great state of California, usually a beacon to the world when it comes to civil liberties, killed the 12th person since the state reinstated the death penalty in the 70s. First, let's get one thing clear. Stanley Williams was found guilty of his crimes against 4 individuals in the late 70s. We can't argue that. What we can argue is how it can be legal for a government to kill an individual. Several European countries have no dealth penalty, and crime is not a huge problem. The dealth penalty is not a deterrent, and I believe the justice system's main job, aside from "justice" is to act as a deterrent to prevent people from committing crimes. So why use something that is obviously not working? Not to mention the fact that there are some executed who may have been innocent. What happens when someone is executed, only to be found innocent shortly thereafter? Can we hold the government accountable for murder?

Might I also note that I switched over to Fox to get their opinion, not the news, fox gives opinions. And right after on CNN the Warden who has been involved with other executions, even though his first in California, said that a "glare" that Williams gave the media was nothing that seemed to be intimidating, only to those not used to the prison system and death row; I flipover to Fox, and one of their reporters says "Call it what you want, it was clearly a look to intimidate us. This was definitely a pre-meditated thing, you can't deny that" Thanks Fox...thanks for being fair and balanced, like always!