Category: Domestic Affairs

When Murderers Deserve the Death Penalty

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has been sentenced to death. It took six years to execute Timothy McVeigh after he was found guilty of killing 168 people, including 19 children at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

Massachusetts isn’t OK with the death penalty (under state law no one has been executed since 1947), but Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s outrageous crime may have changed the minds of many Massachusetts citizens. Which brings up the question under what circumstances is the death penalty justified? Is it multiple killings or the savagery of the killings or is that the killer shows no remorse or what else?

At the end of the day there are reasons for determining that someone has committed a crime that is so heinous that there can be no other penalty than death. Massachusians will have to make that decision just as the citizens of every state must reach a decision.

The Total Number of Death Row Inmates as of January 1, 2015: 3,019 … California, 743, Oklahoma, 49, Kansas, 10. Florida, 403, Mississippi, 48, etc.

What right do these killers have to live?  The killing of even one person is justification for the death penalty with limited appeals for those found guilty.

Presidential Contradiction

President Barack Obama continues to be a mystery to me. Both in domestic and foreign affairs he speaks words and take actions that contradict.  His actions are really alarming.

He raised the troop levels in Afghanistan saying that the United States was there and we were responsible for the outcome.  Then he decided to withdraw all of our troops.

“Assad must go” were Obama’s words.  Use of chemical weapons was declared a red line but no troops were sent to Syria.  Instead Russia provided the president with a way out of the dilemma of his own making.

Ukraine has been part of the Russian empire for over 100 years.  My grandparents left Russia in about the year 1900.  Actually they left Ukraine. Watch “Fiddler on the Roof.”  The fear of the Jews was of the Czar of Russia.  Today the United States is contemplating aid to Ukraine to fight Russia.  Or are we contemplating aid?

The president has been a leading spokesman in the battle to reduce carbon emissions.

He does not want to approve the XL Pipeline.  He set aside additional areas of Alaska where oil exploration will be prohibited.  Now he has approved the building of an oil exploration derrick in the Bearing Sea to be built and maintained by Shell Oil.

Obama has said he is concerned about the shrinking middle class but still he wants to implement a free trade agreement that will enable more jobs to be outsourced to countries that have low paid labor that will benefit business with higher net income.

Perhaps it’s the stress of the job as president that has caused Barack Obama to pursue so many contradictory decisions.  Then again there might be some conflicts of interest.  No matter what the cause his decision making is making other nations uncomfortable and causing Democrats and the entire American population to wonder about the decision making process.