Obama is wrong on the Death Penalty

I was saddened to see that Obama supports the death penalty for offenses other than murder. I am not shocked that virtually all mainstream politicians back the death penalty, because there is a general lack of backbone in modern politics. But to be for using the death penalty in cases other than murder is to open a door that should remain closed.

This is another area where our grandchildren will look back on our society and wonder how we could have been so backward? Most of the developed nations of the world have abolished the death penalty. The death penalty is immoral on so many levels that I will leave an exhaustive list to another time, but, off the top of my head, reasons include: the disproportionate number of male, minority, and poor people executed, non-reversibility when mistakes are discovered, the cost of fairly administering the death penalty, the public clamor to cut the cost and string people up quicker, the sanctioning of state violence, the affects on the families and children of the executed, and the general immorality of killing other human beings.

Hopefully once Obama is in office he will find the political courage to stand up on this critical moral issue. We are one of the last civilized nations to embrace the death penalty and that is not something we should be proud about. We certainly don't need to expand its use to non-murder convictions. Without traveling too far down a slippery slope, there is now a clear delineation between what is fair game for capital punishment and what is not; if we remove that line we empower many other interest groups and the government itself to start making cases for further expansion of this horrendous penalty.

But most of all, remember that it is possible for completely innocent citizens to be convicted due to a confluence of circumstances or the malice of a political enemy or even the career goals of an overzealous prosecutor. Any one of us, or our brothers or sons, may one day be on the wrong side of an unjust capital offense. We must not cast aside justice and compassion in our race to rid the world of evil. Evil, after all, is most often perpetrated by those who believe they have right on their side. Let us not be myopic and fail to recognize when we have become party to that end.

I am Proud to be a Californian tonight

I am proud to be a Californian tonight. We are the second state to ban discrimination against our gay sisters and brothers. They fought hard for equal rights, and they deserve to be recognized as full members of society like the rest of us.

Congratulations to Lesbian activist Phyllis Lyon, 84, and her partner Del Martin, 87, who were married this evening at city hall in San Francisco. Congratulations to everyone else who have waited and fought for this day. Congratulations to all who were married today, and congratulations to all who will be married in the next few weeks.

This is a day of which Californians can be truly proud. It's the 21st Century, and we have arrived only 8 years late. Let us hope that the other 48 states are not far behind Massachusetts and California. It is time for an end to bigotry and hatred. Let us remember April 16, 2008 as an important date for liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

The Gap Between the Rich and the Poor

The gap between the rich and the poor keeps getting wider. Read about it here: The Nation.