disgusted with the world

[FelipesMom]

So... first Obama and the attorney general state that KSM will be convicted and put to death (apparently without realizing that a foregone conclusion makes a fair trial impossible), and now this.

In case you didn't click the link, it's an NPR story about how the plastinated human bodies touring the country are either possibly the bodies of unwilling donors, including executed political prisoners in China (as in the case of Body Worlds), or definitely the bodies of unwilling donors from China, probably including executed political prisoners (as in the case of BODIES... The Exhibition). This kind of stuff makes me want to scream. If you need to be told what's wrong with this situation, then I don't think i'd have the patience to explain it to you...

As for KSM and American-style justice... As it happens, I don't believe in the death penalty (why do we kill people who kill people to prove that killing people is wrong?) - but let's pretend I do, because I really think the life-in-prison-without-parole-vs.-death-sentence part of this story is the least important part. I am as eager as any other decent human being to see the man responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people on 9/11/01 get what's coming to him. What separates me from my own gosh-darned* president and attorney general, apparently, is that I think the man deserves a fair trial. We didn't invent the rules of justice to be nice to people!!! They are SUPPOSED to work for the guilty!!! That's the whole freakin' POINT! You don't reserve justice for the innocent! And really, if our justice system can't convict and sentence (to life or death) the man who masterminded the 9/11 attacks, something is seriously wrong with that system!!! So when Obama states that KSM WILL be convicted and put to death, that's a problem. It's a problem because you simply can't have a fair trial if you start with a verdict and work your way backwards. That's just wrong. And when the attorney general says the same thing, I start getting scared. What is this country coming  to??

Furthermore, I think the attorney general is an idiot - he said he was sure that the trial would be "a success." If a trial is a success, that means the truth was discovered and proven - but that's not what he meant. What he meant was that KSM would be convicted. That is NOT how you defiine a trial's success!! A successful trial is NOT defined as "a trial that reached a verdict I liked or expected." That's like in the old TV shows when the scientist announces the experiment was a failure - the point of an experiment is NOT to reach a given conclusion, it is to test a hypothesis! If you don't like the results, too bad for you, but the experiment wasn't a failure - not unless it failed to prove anything at all. Same goes for a trial. If you discover the truth, the trial is a success - whether you like the verdict or not. The freakin' WORD verdict MEANS truth!!! (It comes from Latin - related to the Spanish word  verdad, "truth"). It does NOT mean "results that I was hoping for"!!!

Rrgh.

*I am really thinking very bad words here, but just can't bring myself to call the President of the United States (and that goes for any president) such things, even in an innocuous little CafeMom vent.

[Tauna1208]

Nov. 18, 2009 at 10:12 PM

Oh wow.  I really didn't want more disappointing news from Obama.  I haven't been paying much attention...mostly because it feels so pointless to care.  But I'm with you on all accounts...a fair trial to find out the truth is what we need (and the victims' families need).  There's no need to 'predict' the outcome they want.  And the death penalty...I don't like it, either.  It's so illogical, expensive, not healing for anyone and any possibility of wrong convictions just makes it worse.

I didn't read the NPR link, but that is disturbing about the bodies.  My hackles got a bit raised earlier today when I saw the people came from China...gives me a bad feeling, even though the exhibit seems interesting.  Now there's no way I'd want to support it.

[earthmama65]

Nov. 19, 2009 at 1:20 PM

I so hear ya mama...*sigh*

[Imamom4sure]

Nov. 19, 2009 at 10:09 PM

thanks so much for posting this in your journal!