Quote Originally Posted by Veldan Rath View Post
Loki, this is when I pull my hair out when it looks like you purposefully miss the point.

The argument that you can kill an innocent man in error, is not on the same line that 'any punishment is permanent'.

There is a stark difference in the degree of going to Prison for 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, and Death, and you know it.
Except the likelihood that an innocent man who spends 10 years in prison will be found to be innocent is incredibly low. People spend so much time on death row (and get extra appeals), that chances are any evidence that could possibly exist to exonerate the prisoner would be found before he's executed (assuming such evidence exists).

So why the obsession with the fact that our system might perhaps kill a handful of innocent people, while not caring about the fact that the same system likely imprisons hundreds (if not thousands) of innocent people for lengthy periods of time? I don't get why 5 incorrect executions are worse than hundreds of incorrect life sentences (which will not get overturned, despite what you claim).