Some thoughts about the death penalty

[This is not an advocacy for or against it, or whom it should be imposed on, just a few opinions on how it should be carried out, with some caveats and also recommendations.]

The man who said he was too fat to fry (in his Supreme Court appeal) was finally put to death in Florida on the new "Old Sparky" electric chair, which just was the same old electronics as the old electric chair but with a new frame, because the old one was worn out and had splinters. He sprayed blood all over the place and grossed out all the witnesses, like the guy who caught on fire a few years ago. So the question is what is the best way to kick a scumbag out of this world without getting the ASPCA involved. Here are several of the methods:
  • Frying (the electric chair) -- disadvantage: it's similar to throwing lobsters into a pot of boiling water
  • Gassing (gas chamber) -- how long can you hold your breath, and why bother
  • Hanging (two methods)
    • Breakneck drop -- pretty good, actually
    • Strangling dance on the end of a rope -- absolutely barbaric
  • Firing squad -- bang bang, you're dead, but you have to listen to that ready aim fire shit first, and sometimes the squad doesn't aim that well
  • Beheading -- nice and quick but very messy, and how long does the head stay alive after separation?
    • Headsman ax -- chop chop and they used to let you make a statement first
    • Samurai Sword -- get in a grovelling position, then whack
    • Guillotine -- mass production, but did the model provide drains?
  • Lethal Injection -- whimpy
  • Burning at the stake -- about as bad as it can get unless the smoke kills you first
  • Crucifixion -- nasty Roman torture, you'd have thought they'd be more civilized
  • Carving out of the heart -- well, the Aztec victims regarded this as part of life
  • Impalement up the anus -- Vlad Dracula's specialty, really revolting
  • Boiling -- who did this? The Japs in Shogun
  • Defenestration -- A Czeckoslovakian specialty, throwing somebody out of a fifth-floor window
  • Stoning to death -- nasty Moslem habit to take care of women who think
  • Bullet in the back of the head -- standard Chinese execution, and the familly is charged for the cost of the bullet
If you are into death penalties, which do you prefer?

I abhor the idea of imposing an execution on any human being, but in the overview there are folks who just don't deserve to live after what they have done. My personal vote is for the bullet-in-the-back-of-the-neck method, efficient, not very messy, and no prolonged agony. Nobody should ever have to die because of politics, only sadistic or greedy or egoistic people who walk all over others (you will note that this includes, as death-penalty eligible, 'white collar' crooks who rip off grandmothers' life savings -- they deserve execution more than Mafia hit-men do).

-- Julio Luigi Lefkowitz Herlihy