Herman Strating

The Death Penalty Herman Strating

The Capital punishment controversy in the U. S. A. is a political rather than a legal issue, with religion thrown in to impose guilt on the supporters. The most vocal anti-death penalty leaders are clerics cum politicians - Pope Francis, former President Jimmy Carter, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Reverend Jesse Jackson, Reverend Al Sharpton, Catholic Sister Helen Prejean-and consequently the debate cannot, as it should, be separated from religion and politics. Herman Strating is an atheist, politically independent, and as such his pro capital punishment position is purely utilitarian, unencumbered by religion and/or politics. With religion in its death throes, the abolitionists' focus is shifting from the sanctity to the dignity of the life of a murderer. Nonsense! Should God exist, in the Judeo-Christian tradition where we find most abolitionists, life is dirt cheap in his eyes. The modern politically correct objection that capital punishment attacks a murderer's dignity is equally ridiculous. A monster who abducts, rapes, tortures and murders a child has no dignity. The majority of the American public, and more importantly the vast majority of victims' families, are for the death penalty, and so it comes down to a clash between the victims' families and their abolitionist tormentors.