These religious extremists need to be waterboarded in prison.

[metapunditedgy]

Maybe every day or two. Roeder and the Hutaree, of course. Buncha religious extremists with connections to other violent extremists. Who knows how many lives could be saved? And isn't that the point, to save lives?

(Actually, is it unconstitutional to waterboard whiter people? Do we do that?)

Sorry for the sarcasm, I'm in a bad mood tonight.

[Warpy]

1. No, they just need to be locked up where they can't hurt the rest of us

and kept there until either they die or they're so senile they can't remember what they were so angry about and can be safely packed off to a nursing home.

It's a public health issue, not a punitive one, IMO. Just make sure they can't hurt anybody. We don't have to hurt them, the frustration will be enough.

[Hekate]

2. We still have a system of justice under law, not vengeance by mob. How we treat the worst...

... says much about the rest of us. Let's not complete the work Bush-Cheney started, that of breaking faith with our Constitution and breaking people's faith in our system of justice.

And whatever the flaws and failings in our system of Constitutional law, let's work to perfect it, not further degrade and destroy it.

Hekate

[Golden Raisin]

3. Beautifully and elegantly stated.

But I would be a liar if I did not admit that this week 2 news stories (Roeder and the 15-year-old Irish girl who tragically committed suicide due to vicious bullying) succeeded in provoking my emotions to overtake rationality and made me momentarily fantasize that we lived in a society where they still meted out horrifying biblical/medieval punishments like chopping off of hands.

[Hekate]

5. Thank you...

I absolutely understand that emotional response. It gets triggered in me from time to time as well; I think it's fairly normal when we're confronted with something outrageous and heinous.

But ultimately I come back to my core belief that Law and Justice are supposed to be dispassionate and rise above the mob. So thanks for hearing me.

Hekate

[Iggo]

4. Yes, except really no instead.