Yanks only: Who are you voting for on Tuesday?

[The Ozzman]

I guess every state is rigged then

 

[General Zaroff]

LOL anyone hear about the Black Panther incident?

 

[Omni]

I think child molesters, rapists and violent sex offenders should get chemical castration

I fixed that for you.

 

[audiophileguy]

Ya better get ready for the Great...

...if the chosen one doesn't win

 

[Omni]

So you're going to freak out if Obama doesn't win and devolve into a hairy ape?

 

[The Ozzman]

I fixed that for you.

I actually agree with you

Ya better get ready for the Great...

...if the chosen one doesn't win

LMAO

Pic of the year

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

Epic. But Jorge, you're a fag.

 

[General Zaroff]

Ya better get ready for the Great...

...if the chosen one doesn't win

 

[metal_wrath]

You asshole. Really. The Ron Paul write-in is fine, but Yes on Prop 8 is a fucking asshole move.

Agreed, why should the government prevent people like you from getting married to your gay male lover/sex buddy?

 

[skeptik]

Like I said, without universal application of sentencing for murder, this logic doesn't fly, since most who commit murder in the US(unless in Texas maybe) probably don't expect the death penalty.

"This logic" has nothing to do with the consequences because it assumes that the person in question doesn't care about the consequences at all.

Again, without universal application of justice this doesn't fly. It could just as easily go the other way and prove why those areas still keeping the detah penalty have left it on the books, as the lower crime rate areas haven't felt the need to do so.

Why are you incapable of understanding that these statistics only apply to offenses for which the death penalty is applicable? You can keep saying "this logic doesn't fly" and it doesn't make it mean anything more than the last time you said it, it's just a meaningless utterance. "This logic" indicates that there is no correlation between a reduction in the rates of death penalty eligible crimes and the application of the death penalty. In other words, there is no significant determination that suggests that there is anything about the death penalty that deters criminals more than any other punishment. Please look at the link that I provided and evaluate the other evidence suggesting that the death penalty is not a deterrent. There are many other issues at hand than the simple fact that the death penalty has done nothing to lower the rate of violent crime in areas in which the death penalty is applied.

For once, you completely missed the point of what I said. Read it again.

You are being stupid. That's the only way that I can possibly explain why you would say this. The statistics that I provided are only applicable to death penalty related crimes. IF the death penalty was a deterrent, it would inevitably have some impact of some kind on the incidence of violent crime. Whether or not the death penalty is applied to every crime ever has no bearing on the fact at hand, namely that crimes that are applicable to the death penalty have not gone down due to the death penalty being a deterrence. It's very simple. Here, follow this logic: If the death penalty was a deterrent, then people considering committing acts which would warrant that the death penalty be applied to their case would more often be deterred from committing the crimes, and would thus see a decrease in the rate of these particular crimes that are subject to the death penalty.

Prison doesn't have anything to do with keeping harmful elements out of society until they are no longer deemed harmful,

Then why do we release prisoners? The judge sentences a convict to a partly arbitrary length of sentence during which the judge feels it is a significant enough duration after which the convict would have been able to be rehabilitated to some degree, enough so to be rereleased into the world. If this was not the case, then why would we release people that we know are harmful back into society.

because there is no way to fucking determine that.

There's also no way to definitely determine whether or not you are likely to commit a violent crime, so this is a poor defense.

It IS to punish. Of course it doesn't work in practice, because only a fool would think that by sticking a bad apple in a barrel of bad apples you will somehow get good apples out. That is exactly what our current penal system is.

Surely you agree at least that the function of the prison system primarily is to remove harmful elements from society. Why else would we care? We put people behind bars because we don't want them to continue to do more harm. The government is not a body that is supposed to be concerned with retribution and revenge on an individual level. Somebody doesn't get locked up directly because they killed your mother, but because they're harmful overall, primarily. Individual punishment is a secondary, not primary function.

Anyone can be "rehabilitated". The problem is, how do you determine when someone is rehabilitated? You CAN'T. Punishment is the issue here, rehabilitation is a utopian concept that is completely illogical in practice.

Obviously there is a problem in how to determine if somebody is rehabilitated, and would have to be examined, and there will never be absolute certainty, but then again, there is no way to determine that you won't go apeshit tomorrow either. Nothing is 100% certain. Focusing on rehabilitation, however, is far more in the interests of society as a whole, as it not only relieves the prison system on a regular basis by (in theory) maintaining a sufficient turnover rate that alleviates the overpopulation of the prison systems, which thereby greatly improves the conditions of the prisons themselves and the rate of crime that goes on within prisons. It furthermore gives more money back to the taxpayer by having one less mouth to feed and more importantly, one more person back in the work force, being a productive member of society as opposed to a financial burden for taxpayers.

You see the logic in that? I agree that in mostly passionate circumstances the murderer will not consider much of anything at all, other than their intent at the moment. But is that logic? People lack reason during crimes of passion. Amirite?

Does it matter whether or not it's "logic"? These are still the same people committing the crimes whether or not they are coherent and taking the consequences into consideration.

Will you not answer about the general extension of the logic that consequences are a deterrent? Do you think I am utterly wrong to expect some correlation?

I don't think this is a worthwhile point. Of course some people will be deterred by the death penalty, but evidence suggests that on a macro level its deterrence element is virtually nonexistent. I hardly see why a correlation would logically be expected.

So you're saying, by extension, that life in prison is a bigger deterrent to crimes which warrant the death penalty, right?

No.

That is exactly where that logic lands us, correct?

No.

Because if there was no correlation at all, we would be able to assume that the consequence is not a factor. So then, my logic holds up and it appears that while people consider committing murder some of them DO think about the consequences, and life in prison is less desirable than death.

There are no broad generalizations that can possibly be made given the evidence that we have. The fact of the matter is that some people are less likely to commit a crime for one reason, some for another. But based on the evidence that we have, no severe punishment by itself and in itself is a significant deterrent to crime.

 

[SweptbackFlame]

So...who's leading right now? I'm too lazy to turn on the TV. I know it's just starting, but I'm just curious.

 

[The Ozzman]

102-34 Obama

This is ridiculous. Polls closed 4 minutes ago and Obama got 99 more votes.

 

[Hubster]

Watching coverage from here in Sydney and it looks like Obama is getting smashed, wtf

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

He's not.

 

[King Richard]

This thing needs to update. Fox just said McCain won Alabama and Georgia.

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

why are you watching fox

 

[King Richard]

That was the channel I left it on after family guy was over, what does it matter?

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

It's a piece of shit. Watch CNN.

 

[The Ozzman]

It's a piece of shit. Watch CNN.

LOL

Just as bad tbh

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

You're a fucking faggot.

nm you frequently post news by drudge report, your opinion is disqualified sir