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Originally Posted by Alex Stroup
I think it is wrong to say that the death penalty "simply doesn't" make anybody feel better. It most certainly does make some people feel better.
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Fair enough. My statement was a general one based on repeated research that the
majority of victims' families have said that they did not feel the closure they expected (and were often lead to expect by prosecuters) after the execution. That case is clearly a rare exception.
It does bring up a slightly murkier area for me. Stripped of the cost of uncertainty (both monetary and moral costs), in a case where the evidence is clear and the defendant admits to everything, would I support the deat penalty? Though I honestly haven't satisfied myself with an answer to that question, I feel I still lean against it. I am not comfortable with empowering the state to take a life in that manner. No matter how heinous the crime and how certain the conviction, human life is not in the purview of government.