So there it is. Saddam Hussein gets a death sentence. Justice has been served. I mean, just hang the guy and get it over with.
Of course, Swedish internal law activists were quick to condemn the death sentence. Quite frankly, I don’t know why they did, because I turned off the TV, but I imagine that it’s something about it being a death sentence, and I imagine the discussion on TV went something like this:
- Well, what do you say, Lars, it is a terrible sentence. Condemning him to death and all.
- Quite right, Göran, it is so not justified.
- Think about the poor dictator’s feelings! He’s a victim of society, that’s what the problem is.
- Yah, all those violent Iraqis just want to kill each other.
- I think we could do so much better, you know, Lars.
- Yah, Göran! A minimum-security jail for a few years.
- Yah, with rehabilitation to get him back into society!
- Oh, I know! Why don’t we reinstate him into power in Iraq!
- Yah, and then he could end the violence spread by all those evil American soldiers!
- Yah, and then he will have to live for the rest of his life …
- … with his bad conscience!! Oh, you are so wicked, Lars!
- Yah, I know. Say, that’s a nice shirt you’re wearing.
- Oh, thank you.
Most commentators that are against the death penalty against Saddam says that 1) it’s a lighter punishment to be hanged than spend the rest of his years in jail. 2) He will become a martyr for a lot of people if he is hanged. In jail he will be a sorry excuse for a leader. Keep him alove and let all the victims of his tyranny be heard in a long serie of trials. If they kill him now those people will not be heard.
That’s the pragmatic reasons not to kill him. Then we have the principal argument against the death penalty. It’s not that I feel sorry for the Saddam, but I think we should abolish the death penalty. It doesn’t help to scare people away from crime and there is always a risk of killing innocents (it has happend, you know).
I quote an American catholic priest: “Mistakes can and have been made; recently a number of prisoners on death row have been found innocent. The death penalty is still applied in a discriminatory way: the poor and minorities are more likely to be sentenced to death. Capital punishment further contributes to our culture’s conviction that violence is a way to solve problems, as in abortion and euthanasia. Executions also undermine our society by promoting hatred and revenge.”