I know she has her detractors, but Hillary Clinton has had a long and distinguished political career and seems to be on the cusp of having it culminate with the ultimate triumph and at least one term in the Oval Office. Yet, I’m still waiting for her to appear on the ramparts anywhere rather than showing up once all the hard work has been done and the streets appear safe.
“I do not favor abolishing it, however, because I do think there are certain egregious cases that still deserve the consideration of the death penalty, but I’d like to see those be very limited and rare, as opposed to what we’ve seen in most states,” Clinton said.
As any thinking person knows, the case for abolishing the death penalty does not rest on the idea that no one ever commits egregious crimes. There’s always a legitimate moral argument that someone who takes a life doesn’t deserve to go on living themselves. But what a person in some sense “deserves” is not the point.
If you cannot humanely execute the deserving without doing so selectively, or you can’t avoid executing the undeserving, then you should err on the side of showing mercy to the deserving.
There’s another whole moral case to make about who has the authority to make life and death decisions, and an even stronger one (in my opinion) about the death penalty being detrimental to the morals of the people who have to carry out the sentence. But these are supplemental to the core issue, which is that we can’t devise a system that doesn’t make mistakes and we can’t devise a system that provides an fair and equitable distribution of justice.
We ought to abolish the death penalty for a host of reasons, but the most important one is that we neither want to execute the innocent nor only those who are the least sympathetic or have the least adequate legal representation.
The worst justification for the death penalty is that some people deserve to die. We all know this. Yet, the vast majority of the world has rightly concluded that the state shouldn’t be vested with the authority or responsibility to give those people what they deserve.
I can’t escape the idea that Clinton will come around to this view as soon as the American people first lead the way. I’m tired of watching this pattern repeat itself.
I read this and immediately understood that this was designed to be appealing to the broadest possible swath of her possible electorate.
Some states will continue to move towards banning the death penalty. Some will grease the slide towards the execution chamber.
Perhaps she should aim towards abolishing the death penalty in order to get its application reduced. Overton window and shit.
But I think she’s already positioning herself for next November, and this is a smart place to be. We execute too many people. It’s obscene. But the ad of: “Hillary Clinton wouldn’t want Osama bin Laden to get the death penalty” (as absurd as that might be) will stick with those working class whites we hope she can bring a few percentage points back into the party.
It’s nice to have a moral case against the death penalty, but there was a moral case for single payer, too. Morality doesn’t mean shit in winning elections or advancing an agenda.
MLK didn’t force change on the South because of morality. He did it because he shut down commerce. He did it by highlighting the worst abuses. Once he tried to seize the moral high ground in Chicago, people stopped listening to him.
“Morality doesn’t mean shit in advancing an agenda.”
Does leadership?
The President can’t do all things, or even most things, that they want to do. For the President, a key feature of leadership is prioritizing; picking the important things to try to do.
The President actually has little influence on the death penalty. It’s mostly a state matter. Congress could theoretically pass laws to restrict it, but that’s not about to happen and, again that’s not something that the President can do much about.
Hillary (or any President) simply won’t be able to do much of anything to stop the death penalty in 2017-2020 so it is good leadership for her to worry about maximizing her chances for getting elected rather than engage in futile grandstanding.
Timothy McVeigh Targeted assassinations.
So a president, for example, coming late, but emphatically, to the cause of equal marriage would be futile grandstanding? Or being emphatic in support of Black Lives Matter?
I think you have an attenuated definition of leadership. Rick Perlstein (http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/qotd-rick-perlstein.html):
Grandstanding is often not futile. In fact, it’s often the most effective way to communicate political values to the public.
Hillary has unequivocal support for equal marriage, and has indeed been out front on the police on blacks, being the first of the various Presidential candidates to talk about it. So what exactly are you asking for?
You might be tired of it but neither she nor her hubby is going to change any of their ways anytime soon. Now they even seem to be having another repeat performance, this time a bit of a problem with the IRS about their so-called foundation:
https://www.byline.com/project/27/article/520.
And what’s ‘so-called’ about the foundation…
giant pr and grift machine is more accurate term
True, but aren’t they all?
Yes maybe. But this one will have direct access to the innermost power of the US government if HRC becomes president. Even if she steps aside, as she probably will be required to de, she will be in a position to distribute goodies to donors. I have no idea what the status of her husband and daughter will be during her possible presidency. See https://www.byline.com/project/27/article/520. They’re quite a pice of work, that family.
what do you mean by all? I was responding to the Clinton Foundation point;
I meant family foundations. They seem to be there to provide income and status to family members outside of the real world, while avoiding estate taxes.
I see. I think they’re mostly about avoiding taxes. And the ones I’ve read about don’t accept donations, they’re sort of closed money vaults for family to avoid taxes, give $ for some good works to retain their status. recently heard of one that accepted donations but it was copying Clinton’s and grifting from what it looked like. Clintons have used theirs to hire their friends and network internationally.
Not all. There are still a few left that aren’t more fundraising grift than doing actual and valuable good works.
Given that the article includes this chestnut:
…that’s been long disproven, I’d take this with a very large grain of salt. It reads more like someone with an axe to grind than actual journalism.
This is why there’s so much doubt and uncertainty around HRC. Same thing with her inability to fend off RW attacks — she seems uncertain as to WHY she believes what she believes. It all seems so calculated…
WHICH IS HARD TO SAY OUT LOUD IN PUBLIC because I’m male, and think I must have a gender-based blindspot since so many women I admire think HRC’s the bomb…
Ask yourself this: Would you vote for her if she were a man named Bush. No other changes.
The Clinton political strategy always has been one of waving no red flags in front of the charging elephant. For some reason, that seemed to enrage the elephant more. Someone should investigate that peculiar response. I think it has something to do with fear of their base actually liking Clinton’s policies if they actually think about them instead of being screamed at by shock jocks.
After a quarter century, old habits are hard to break even if the sentiment in the country might be changing.
I can’t count it up at the moment, but I doubt that the vast majority of the world has abolished the death penalty. China still executes people. Russia still executes people. I don’t know about other Middle Eastern countries, but Saudi Arabia most definitely executes people. India executes people. And then there’s the US.
The EU is great. I love EU countries. But that’s not the vast majority of the world.
Abolition in fact or in practice: here.
Interesting that Russia is considered abolitionist in practice. I figured they still execute people.
Again, I’m just eye-balling it, but if you have India, China, Indonesia and several other less populated places executing people, then you’re already at about half of the world living in states that use the death penalty.
The countries that still have the death penalty are hardly ones we would want to emulate.
ah, yes, China and Saudi Arabia; just the countries we want to be reckoned our peers
It’s just an observation. I’d like to abolish the death penalty too. I’m glad I live in a state without it.
I understand, but it’s not just a matter of numbers, it’s what kind of countries and states have it or have done something about it. also I’m not much for a “we can’t do anything about it” approach to anything actually since usually it has implicit, let’s not try
Even if the public came around to wanting to abolish the death penalty, she wouldn’t ever give it the tiniest bit of effort to make it a Federal policy. She sees thing as them or us, enemy or friend. The public came around about marriage equality, but she’s still not a strong supporter of it. If pushed, she’d sign DOMA again, and would be open to DADT if cornered.
That’s a fairly large leap to make.
It is a large leap but it reflects some belief she is more interested in power and polls than serving and leading.
Why is it bad to pursue power? Power is the only way anything gets done.
She doesn’t have our backs. It’s as simple as that.
Don’t know why you say that. The Clinton Foundation is an important component in the global campaign against HIV and TB, and does a lot of other good work. I wouldn’t want to have a beer with many of their donors, to put it mildly, but their money is green.
The problem isn’t that the foundation is not doing good works — it is! — but it does create an appearance of conflict of interest for somebody who wants to be president. I don’t think that’s a real issue, the Clintons don’t pocket the money, after all, and the federal government controls orders of magnitude more resources so the question of how well the foundation coffers are filled won’t matter much to her once she’s Prez. I’m actually more disturbed by some of the speaking fees.
Nebraska abolished the death penalty – thanks to Ernie Chambers and a cost argument that appealed to republicans
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/28/us/nebraska-abolishes-death-penalty.html?_r=0
Hillary Clinton has had a long and distinguished political career
Not so long — eight years as a Senator and four as SOS. (No, I don’t count her years as First Lady because she wasn’t elected or appointed to that role and other than the messes during the first two years, officially she did nothing more than most First Ladies.) What exactly did she do while in office that is admirable?
Democrats decried the GWB’s signing of Karla Faye Tucker’s death warrant and give Clinton a pass for signing Ricky Ray Rector’s.
Gov George Ryan may have been a crook, but in 2000 he suspended the death penalty in IL for correct reasons.
There are so many excellent reasons to oppose the death penalty. From the completely practical one that it costs the state a lot more to execute a person than it does to retain them in custody for life to the state having to employ an executioner. Anyone that wants such a job isn’t one that the state should employ.
I’m waiting for Clinton supporters to stop spinning, lying, excusing, etc., her record and her positions on all issues, and stand with her on all of them that.
aka, a follower. We do invest the word leader with a positive connotation, but to be a leader one only needs to be front and center to move a populace in a different direction from where it is and wants to go. All peoples need good leaders. Such people that have the capacity to lead with vision, ethics, and rationality.
I’ll grant her rationality.
You’re more generous than I am. Nothing rational about the death penalty or the Iraq War and policy to oust Ghaddafi and Assad in the name of the American people. It may be rational for her to support policies that favor her wealthy buddies but she’s dishonest about that when speaking before the general public except when she slips up on her talking points and reveals her true agenda.
Hillary asked Elizabeth Warren to explain the credit card bankruptcy bill then decided to convince Bill to not support it. Then as NY Senator she voted for it. Hillary supports raising the minimum wage but not to $15 an hour. The TPP was the gold standard of trade deals until it didn’t poll well. Support for putting LGBT discrimination into Federal law was to prevent a constitutional amendment. Why am I not surprised she now wants it both ways on the death penalty? This Clinton triangulating list is far too long for her to ever be trusted with the presidency.
Bernie nailed it when he explained the difference between them was he would and did take the hard vote when it was a hard vote. That is what leadership is about and the kind of leader we so desperately need.
Triangulating is a fancy word for putting both sides in a box and forced to accept an equal proportion of compromises neither side wants. For the most part what Clinton did was snooker Democrats and give them little or nothing that they desired and give Republicans all or almost all that they wanted.
Well said.
Bernie did explain their differences. But his chances of winning are rather slim. And Hillary does indeed lead from behind. She adopts what she sees as the winning side at the time. I suppose I can accept that to some extent. But I simply do not trust her. What she does or does not support today or say in a debate is just as likely to change tomorrow. I feel like I am between a rock and a hard place. The glorious ten are simply nuts and Hillary changes based on the weather forecast. At the moment she wins for me in part bc of the supreme court appointments that are likely to be made in the future and heaven help us if we get more Scalias from the crazy people. But things change, right?
Obama’s chances of winning were slim as well. Bernie is ahead of where Obama was at this point in his campaign with more contributors and larger crowds who are still looking for real hope and change. Of course you are between a rock and a hard place if Hillary is all there is, we all are. We may or may not get good Supreme Court nomination when Hillary gets through triangulating the issue. If Bernie wins the nomination he will become President so vote for Bernie in the primary and convince all your friends to vote for Bernie as well instead of just saying he has no chance. When he wins the nomination, let the Corporatists Establishment Democrats hold their noses to vote for Bernie in the general. I have held my nose long enough in the past voting for Establishment Democrats.
Sanders polls numbers are as good as Obama’s were at this stage in the election cycle as well. If were objective, it’s easy enough to see that on the fundraising front, Sanders is ahead of Obama because almost all of this money is from small donors and half of Obama’s money came from Wall St., Hollywood, and IL moneybags.
The downside is that Clinton doesn’t have seven competitors and she and Bill have locked down the DEM institutional support, a decades long endeavor.
No doubt Bill and Hillary have locked down DEM institutional support including the media and most pundits. Hillary and Jeb are Wall Street favorites based and Super Pac donations but maybe this week it’s just Hillary. We might as well just skip the election and go straight to the coronation. But wait, there is a problem; the voters. The voters know who she is, what to expect and they don’t like it. They just don’t trust her and they’re correct not to trust her. Bernie tells the truth and is a lone rational voice in a world of spin. The DNC better hope they can prevent Bernie from reaching a wider audience.
Only 45-50% of voters would strongly object to a coronation now, but they’re not unified behind a single crazy, ignorant, unqualified candidate; so, right now their minority factions and as such don’t count. Team Clinton will simply kill off the Sanders’ supporters that refuse to get in line and curtsy for her highness.
So true!
International Business Times, David Sirota: Election 2016: Hillary Clinton Demands Probe of Exxon After Oil Giant Stops Funding Clinton Foundation”
Leadership one can believe in.
wow!
How is it a distinguished career? Its not an embarassment but it seems very middle of the road to me.
As long as she isn’t following “the American people” on a crusade to deport 11 million people, I can live with it.
No, she wouldn’t deprive Tyson Foods of their large illegal workforce. Legal status? Oh, sorry, couldn’t get the Republicans to go along. (wink wink)
Wink wink? Actually no, we really did have a bill that would have passed if only Boehner had allowed a vote. You really can blame the Republicans for that one.
You don’t seriously buy that if Trump should get the nomination his deportation and yuuge wall proposal won’t “evolve” during the general election campaign? To something closer than what the Obama administration has practiced, record high deportations. Not that Obama’s base minds that record.
No, that’s not really my point. I’m just saying that at least Clinton is following the better impulses of the American people in this case. Her embrace of certain liberal positions may be opportunistic, and it doesn’t reflect well on her character, but it still serves to validate those positions.
“Lesser evil” — fewer words to convey what you mean.
Yeah, I know. God forbid Hillary Clinton should ever get any credit for anything.
I’m all ears (or in this forum, all eyes), name one thing that she should get credit for that is as phenomenally good as her IWR vote (just to cite one major criticism of her) is horrendously bad.
Where did that standard come from? Look, I’m not even a Clinton supporter myself, but I won’t have to agonize over whether to vote for her if she gets the nomination. Like it or not, someone is going to be the next president. If you’re not willing to forgive Hillary for the Iraq war, then which of the Republican candidates would you prefer to see in the White House?
How else does one evaluate candidates for public office that enter a race with a huge black mark on his/her record? I suppose one could tote of all the “good things” to erase that black mark. That would give the candidate a score of zero.
I suppose I look at the “black marks” and first evaluate if they are anomalies in the persons record. If so, what accounted for the anomaly. And why wouldn’t a similar anomaly occur in the future? If not, it’s a component of the candidate’s character. Is such character suitable for public office.
What is the relative importance of other positions and acts that don’t rise to the level of a black mark but from a social and economic justice perspective are negatives.
A similar amount of evaluating and weighting should be done wrt a candidate’s claimed accomplishments. Were they prescient and visionary (two qualities that good leaders possess). Important or relatively minor. Consistent with long held and articulated principles and ethics. Did the candidate lead on it or merely follow those that led. etc.
Within narrow spheres of our lives, we humans are predictable if the relevant variables within the sphere are known and properly evaluated. For example, I was in the small minority that opposed launching a large military attack against Afghanistan in response to 9/11 and unlike most people I’d been speaking out against the horrible Taliban government for years. I opposed it for two reasons. The first was that there was no evidence of the Taliban government’s direct participation of the events of 9/11, much less any participation by Afghanis. Second, GWB and Cheney had a long record of being fuck-ups. And if the goal had been to capture/kill/immobilize AQ encampments in Afghanistan, what they had requested was not the way to go about accomplishing that.
I don’t disagree with any of your points, but it’s not a yes or no question. Assuming that Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee, the election next year is not going to be a referendum on her suitability for public office. It’s going to be a choice between her and whoever winds up behind the wheel of the Republican clown car. You don’t have to like or admire her at all to recognize that she’s preferable to any of them.
Unless the candidate that I choose to support for the nomination based on my evaluation of the choices, I don’t bother engaging in general election candidate evaluation until after the nominations are complete. Have yet to live through a presidential election when a Republican or third party candidate won my vote; so, past behavior is generally predictable of future behavior. However, most election cycles the available choices for Democrats weren’t all that good and more often than not the best of the lot wasn’t nominated.
It would be nice if she was out front on some issues that we care about but how many Presidents were? She’ll end up being an about average President and hopefully we won’t go backwards. If she can build on some of President Obama’s accomplishments I would consider that a win for her Presidency.
Take Lincoln, for example — soft on slavery. Holds every conceivable position, depending on the audience — on the key issue facing the nation.
Not worth my ballot.
Yeah, he was “soft” on slavery for the two decades he was on the national public stage and served in a federal office for a dozen years before he issued the Emancipation Proclamation.
And even drafted that document under military necessity and a lot of arm-twisting from some significant advocates of abolition.
The Southern politicians in contrast were cocksure from the beginning, with big plans for Cuba, Mexico, and South America. And a de facto control of territory in current Arizona.
War’s not won yet; no use voting for that Lincoln guy in 1864.
He. Didn’t. Even. Try.
And don’t get me started on that 10% reconstruction nonsense.
Six-and-a-half feet of squish.
Should have nominated Chase. A real progressive…
But that actually highlights why the slaveholders saw Lincoln as such a threat. Their designs on all those territories were based on the assumption that slavery couldn’t survive unless it expanded its range. Lincoln’s policy was based on the same assumption: He wouldn’t interfere with slavery where it currently existed, but he would oppose its further extension. That doesn’t sound quite as lame when you realize the idea was to contain slavery until it died a natural death.
The Confederates certainly didn’t see Lincoln as soft on slavery, anyway. It was his mere election that led the first 11 states to secede.
Didn’t Ken Burn’s documentary say he pushed into issuing it? And it exempting the border states that stayed loyal. Sort of “Watch out or we could do it to you”.
pushed into it, I meant to tyoe.
it exempted all the states not in rebellion because it HAD to. Lincoln had no constitutional right to interfere with slavery. But in the areas under military control he could do that because of the war.
I admit I have not given a lot of attention to this issue, except to be continually shocked at the number of people on death row lately who have been able to prove their innocence.
Years ago I had a couple of friends who were strongly opposed to the death penalty, but their argument was simply that the state did not have the right to end anybody’s life, period, and my argument was (as yours) that there were definitely some people that deserve that penalty, and that having the state due it was a lot better than private revenge or not doing anything.
Your argument here is a lot more sophisticated. I am almost persuaded.
There is are some problems with it, though. In effect you appear o be saying that the state is in principle incompetent to administer justice, at least in capital matters. Or at least to be trusted on that. In fact, why stop there? It is incompetent to administer justice in any criminal matter. The only difference is that, with the death penalty, the injustice CANNOT be rectified.
This sets capital cases apart from the others, but still I cannot help feeling that we are avoiding the real issue, in all miscarriages of criminal justice, which is violations of due process, no?
Anyway, you’ve got me thinking about it for sure.
Even if criminal justice were not only fairly administered and no innocent person was put on death row (per Scalia, innocence is no barrier as long as the accused received a fair trial), it still leaves three other major considerations. Cost. Life imprisonment costs the state far less than killing the guilty party. Executioner. What a terrible job to ask a citizen to perform. State sanctioned killing as retribution and resolution of a “problem.” This goes to the core of a culture and how individuals within it act. There is a correlation between murder rates and the death penalty in economically developed countries and also the level of violence perpetrated by the LEOs within the state.