A Difficult Subject

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/26/washington/26scotuscnd.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

I found this today on the front page of the New York Times, and at first it shocked me. How could the Supreme Court be so liberal on such a heinous crime like rape (and I'm a liberal myself). I don't think giving someone the death penalty for raping a child is in any way unconstitutional. First of all, it's rape for christ's sake. How is robbing a child of their innocence or violating someone's body any less damaging or horrifying than murder (other than the death part)?

However, as I continued to read I realized isn't life in prison with out parole just as bad if not worse than the death penalty? I mean, this is kind of harsh, but at least with the death penalty...you 're dead. Yes there's the horror of knowing you're going to die, but at least then the torment would end. Life with out parole is just a never ending torture. You live in a disgusting, tiny, inhabitable little cell, all by yourself, with no one to talk to other than the guard who escorts you. And you have to live, every day, with the memory of your mistake and wishing it never happened, and thanks to you're stupidity, you may as well be in hell.

Of course, there is the deranged criminal who has no feeling or soul, so either way doesn't make a difference because either A) they want to be dead, or B) they have no shame. I don't really know what I'm trying to say with this one, only I guess that with some it probably wouldn't matter. Thus the idea that life with out parole is bad or worse is irrelevant since it wouldn't matter?

But, again on the pro side of this court ruling, as one of the people interviewed mentioned in the article, removing the possibility of the death sentence removed the victim's wait for the punishment to go underway. Thus it removes the tension and drama of the whole process. Instead the case is over and you know that those conditions could start immediately. There isn't this constant reminder that the criminal who hurt you or your child still has yet to receive their proper punishment. That is, if you think life in jail with out parole is good enough of a punishment in your opinion.

However, there's still the factor that possibly this criminal has committed numerous sex offenses and other such crimes in the past. With all of the damage they've done to numerous people and/or children, I especially don't think that the death penalty is unconstitutional. This person has ruined so many people's lives that they may as well deserve to be on death row.