Trump signs pro-death penalty order, calls capital punishment an ‘essential tool’

[Michie]

President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order seeking to overturn Supreme Court precedents restricting capital punishment and expand states’ access to lethal drugs used in executions.

Trump in his order describes the death penalty as an “essential tool for deterring and punishing those who would commit the most heinous crimes and acts of lethal violence against American citizens.”

The order directs the U.S. attorney general to actively pursue the death penalty in federal cases, particularly for murders of law enforcement officers and crimes committed by people residing in the country illegally and encourages states to do the same.

It also directs the attorney general to ensure that states have a sufficient supply of drugs for lethal injection and to seek the overruling of Supreme Court precedents that limit the authority of state governments to impose capital punishment.

Continued below.

Trump signs pro-death penalty order

Trump in his order describes the death penalty as an “essential tool for deterring and punishing those who would commit the most heinous crimes ...”

www.catholicnewsagency.com

 

[chevyontheriver]

President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order seeking to overturn Supreme Court precedents restricting capital punishment and expand states’ access to lethal drugs used in executions.

Trump in his order describes the death penalty as an “essential tool for deterring and punishing those who would commit the most heinous crimes and acts of lethal violence against American citizens.”

The order directs the U.S. attorney general to actively pursue the death penalty in federal cases, particularly for murders of law enforcement officers and crimes committed by people residing in the country illegally and encourages states to do the same.

It also directs the attorney general to ensure that states have a sufficient supply of drugs for lethal injection and to seek the overruling of Supreme Court precedents that limit the authority of state governments to impose capital punishment.

Continued below.

Trump signs pro-death penalty order

Trump in his order describes the death penalty as an “essential tool for deterring and punishing those who would commit the most heinous crimes ...”

www.catholicnewsagency.com

Here's one place I depart from Trump. I might consider that there is a rare need for the death penalty, but I'm almost, not quite, with pope Francis on this one.

 

[LizaMarie]

Here's one place I depart from Trump. I might consider that there is a rare need for the death penalty, but I'm almost, not quite, with pope Francis on this one.

I'm with the Pope, too and I'm not Catholic. I think there may be rare cases where the death penalty is necessary for premeditated capitol murder only and to save lives, but Trump has been on record since the '80's saying he wants to expand the death penalty to other things such as rape, pedophilia, treason, etc. He argued for the death penalty for the central park 5 for rape in the '80s and they were later exonerated. The woman was raped and injured but not killed.
My own church(WELS) says that the state may wield the sword(death penalty) but I'm with the Pope on this one unless the death penalty is the only way to protect lives(In South Dakota two inmates were executed after they escaped from prison, killed the warden and other prison staff and prisoners, were recaptured, were not remorseful ,and said they would kill again)

 

[LizaMarie]

I'm with the Pope, too and I'm not Catholic. I think there may be rare cases where the death penalty is necessary for premeditated capitol murder only and to save lives, but Trump has been on record since the '80's saying he wants to expand the death penalty to other things such as rape, pedophilia, treason, etc. He argued for the death penalty for the central park 5 for rape in the '80s and they were later exonerated. The woman was raped and injured but not killed.
My own church(WELS) says that the state may wield the sword(death penalty) but I'm with the Pope on this one unless the death penalty is the only way to protect lives(In South Dakota two inmates were executed after they escaped from prison, killed the warden and other prison staff and prisoners, were recaptured, were not remorseful ,and said they would kill again)

My big concern is executing people takes away their chance to repent although with as long as people are on death row in this country....

 

[Wolseley]

I remember a professor I had in college. He had just come back from a vacation he'd spent with his wife down in some little Caribbean country, and he told us that their taxi driver had been chatting with them after picking them up at the airport.

"Where are you folks from?" he had asked them. When they replied they were from the United States, the driver chuckled and said, "Americans don't know how to put people in jail. That's why you have so many problems with crime."

They said, "What are you talking about? We have more people in jail than anywhere else in the world!", and the driver replied, "That's just what I'm talking about! You put people in jail, and they get a bed with blankets, television, exercise time, libraries, visitors, mail from home, medical care, decent food, and so on and on. For some of them, it's a better deal than what they had on the street! Now, down here, they don't get that. When somebody goes to jail down here, they get thrown into a concrete cell about 6x8 feet with one blanket and some straw on the floor. They have a bucket in the corner for bodily functions, and they get fed once a day. No visitors, no mail, no libraries, no anything---and if they step out of line, they'll wish they hadn't. Down here, we have no such thing as repeat offenders. When people get out of our jails, they go straight---because they surely do not want to go back!"

And the taxi driver had a point. If your punishment isn't a punishment, it's a waste of time. And in the case of some of these people---not all, but some---there is no "reform" to them; they are just plain evil, and the only way to protect the law-abiding population from them is to eliminate them. I'm sorry, but it's true. I don't believe in wholesale capital punishment, but I don't have the abhorrence of it completely, like many do. I think this was probably the one issue where St. John Paul II and I didn't quite see eye-to-eye. And after having worked in law enforcement for over twenty years, and seeing some of the stuff that I saw, which I wouldn't wish on anybody, I don't think that in some cases, capital punishment would be out of line for some of these people.

 

[chevyontheriver]

I remember a professor I had in college. He had just come back from a vacation he'd spent with his wife down in some little Caribbean country, and he told us that their taxi driver had been chatting with them after picking them up at the airport.

"Where are you folks from?" he had asked them. When they replied they were from the United States, the driver chuckled and said, "Americans don't know how to put people in jail. That's why you have so many problems with crime."

They said, "What are you talking about? We have more people in jail than anywhere else in the world!", and the driver replied, "That's just what I'm talking about! You put people in jail, and they get a bed with blankets, television, exercise time, libraries, visitors, mail from home, medical care, decent food, and so on and on. For some of them, it's a better deal than what they had on the street! Now, down here, they don't get that. When somebody goes to jail down here, they get thrown into a concrete cell about 6x8 feet with one blanket and some straw on the floor. They have a bucket in the corner for bodily functions, and they get fed once a day. No visitors, no mail, no libraries, no anything---and if they step out of line, they'll wish they hadn't. Down here, we have no such thing as repeat offenders. When people get out of our jails, they go straight---because they surely do not want to go back!"

And the taxi driver had a point. If your punishment isn't a punishment, it's a waste of time. And in the case of some of these people---not all, but some---there is no "reform" to them; they are just plain evil, and the only way to protect the law-abiding population from them is to eliminate them. I'm sorry, but it's true. I don't believe in wholesale capital punishment, but I don't have the abhorrence of it completely, like many do. I think this was probably the one issue where St. John Paul II and I didn't quite see eye-to-eye. And after having worked in law enforcement for over twenty years, and seeing some of the stuff that I saw, which I wouldn't wish on anybody, I don't think that in some cases, capital punishment would be out of line for some of these people.

Wow!

I agree that some people are so dangerous that keeping them alive risks the safety of others. Even locking them up does not neutralize the danger. For these I think the death penalty is necessary. I've been in a supermax prison, as a visitor but not as a resident. Yet even inside there is violent crime.

 

[Mark Quayle]

I remember a professor I had in college. He had just come back from a vacation he'd spent with his wife down in some little Caribbean country, and he told us that their taxi driver had been chatting with them after picking them up at the airport.

"Where are you folks from?" he had asked them. When they replied they were from the United States, the driver chuckled and said, "Americans don't know how to put people in jail. That's why you have so many problems with crime."

They said, "What are you talking about? We have more people in jail than anywhere else in the world!", and the driver replied, "That's just what I'm talking about! You put people in jail, and they get a bed with blankets, television, exercise time, libraries, visitors, mail from home, medical care, decent food, and so on and on. For some of them, it's a better deal than what they had on the street! Now, down here, they don't get that. When somebody goes to jail down here, they get thrown into a concrete cell about 6x8 feet with one blanket and some straw on the floor. They have a bucket in the corner for bodily functions, and they get fed once a day. No visitors, no mail, no libraries, no anything---and if they step out of line, they'll wish they hadn't. Down here, we have no such thing as repeat offenders. When people get out of our jails, they go straight---because they surely do not want to go back!"

And the taxi driver had a point. If your punishment isn't a punishment, it's a waste of time. And in the case of some of these people---not all, but some---there is no "reform" to them; they are just plain evil, and the only way to protect the law-abiding population from them is to eliminate them. I'm sorry, but it's true. I don't believe in wholesale capital punishment, but I don't have the abhorrence of it completely, like many do. I think this was probably the one issue where St. John Paul II and I didn't quite see eye-to-eye. And after having worked in law enforcement for over twenty years, and seeing some of the stuff that I saw, which I wouldn't wish on anybody, I don't think that in some cases, capital punishment would be out of line for some of these people.

They used to say, in one S. American country, that the dictator was the smartest man in the world. Under him, common crime was almost non-existent (not at all saying that political crime wasn't there), the country prospered several-fold, and he made billions. If a man stole, they cut off his hand. If he stole again, they cut off his other hand. If he raped, they cut off something else. If he murdered, he was killed. A child could carry business earnings to the bank in a paper bag, and everyone avoided him. If someone by accident came too close, he did everything he could to see that the child made it to the bank safely. If a man even whistled at a good-looking girl he had to pay a huge fine.

 

[Wolseley]

They used to say, in one S. American country, that the dictator was the smartest man in the world. Under him, common crime was almost non-existent (not at all saying that political crime wasn't there), the country prospered several-fold, and he made billions. If a man stole, they cut off his hand. If he stole again, they cut off his other hand. If he raped, they cut off something else. If he murdered, he was killed. A child could carry business earnings to the bank in a paper bag, and everyone avoided him. If someone by accident came too close, he did everything he could to see that the child made it to the bank safely. If a man even whistled at a good-looking girl he had to pay a huge fine.

A lot of countries around the world have (or used to have) the penalty of losing a hand for stealing. As for a lot of the public safety and decency in America, in 1960, kids could play out in the streets of their neighborhoods all day long, and they were perfectly safe. Nobody was abducting young women from grocery store parking lots and selling them as sex slaves to Russian gangsters. Nobody was importing billions of tons of cocaine and cooking it into meth to get schoolkids hooked on it and turn them into brain-dead dope addicts. All in all, the twenty-year period after the end of World War II was a sort of a "golden age" in America. Yes, the South was still segregated, and women were still pretty much relegated to the roles of housewives, but by and large, things weren't too bad.

Then came the 1960s. Trillions were spent in a war we didn't need to be involved in; drugs became as common as tap water; public trust in government hit the skids; the leaders we elected left an awful lot to be desired; inflation went crazy; and societal and cultural norms regarding things such as marriage, cohabitation, respect for one's elders, loyalty to one's country, etc., went straight out the window. Worst of all, a new generation of bleeding-heart liberal politicians got into office, and they allowed their misguided sense of compassion to override their common sense. Crime went absolutely nuts; punishment became a farce. People were caught, convicted, fined----and turned loose. A man could break into a home, kill a family of four, rape the sixteen-year old daughter before stabbing her to death, steal everything of value in the place, and rather than being hooked up to Old Sparky and executed for such heinous activity, he was sentenced to 25 to life in prison, with possibility of parole after 15 years for good behavior. Justice became a joke.

Again, I don't advocate overuse of the death penalty. But the system we have now is broken. It ain't working.

 

[RileyG]

Here's one place I depart from Trump. I might consider that there is a rare need for the death penalty, but I'm almost, not quite, with pope Francis on this one.

Agreed 100%! I consider the death penalty archaic and barbaric!

 

[RileyG]

My big concern is executing people takes away their chance to repent although with as long as people are on death row in this country....

EXACTLY! That’s also one of my issues!

 

[SeekFirst0]

Agreed 100%! I consider the death penalty archaic and barbaric!

Yes, I am 100% against the death penalty.

 

[AvilaSurfer]

I have read too many stories about death row inmates still being in control of gangs, still issuing death orders, to be anti-death penalty. Rare, yes, but necessary.

 

[FaithT]

I'm with the Pope, too and I'm not Catholic. I think there may be rare cases where the death penalty is necessary for premeditated capitol murder only and to save lives, but Trump has been on record since the '80's saying he wants to expand the death penalty to other things such as rape, pedophilia, treason, etc. He argued for the death penalty for the central park 5 for rape in the '80s and they were later exonerated. The woman was raped and injured but not killed.
My own church(WELS) says that the state may wield the sword(death penalty) but I'm with the Pope on this one unless the death penalty is the only way to protect lives(In South Dakota two inmates were executed after they escaped from prison, killed the warden and other prison staff and prisoners, were recaptured, were not remorseful ,and said they would kill again)

Odd that Trump sexually assaulted a woman and is for the death penalty for some of the crimes listed above.

 

[FaithT]

EXACTLY! That’s also one of my issues!

My concern is for those who were wrongfully convicted and are actually innocent.

 

[RileyG]

My concern is for those who were wrongfully convicted and are actually innocent.

Amen! I agree 100%

 

[FaithT]

Amen! I agree 100%

Can you imagine being wrongfully incarcerated?

 

[RileyG]

Can you imagine being wrongfully incarcerated?

It must be terrifying

 

[FaithT]

In my state four men on death row were exonerated since 1989.

 

[LizaMarie]

My concern is for those who were wrongfully convicted and are actually innocent.

Exactly