On Apr 27, 2007, at 1:38 PM, Lenin's Tomb wrote:
> On 4/27/07, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>> [hanging people from a crane so they take 10 minutes to choke to
>> death...lovely]
>
> It's atrocious. But, if I may add to that obvious assertion one
> further: death from electrocution can take as long (say if the heart
> is still beating five minutes after the first shock has been
> administered, they'll go ahead and have another go), and being fried
> isn't necessarily easier on the senses. I don't know if lethal
> injection is any better come to that, what with the prolonged
> armageddon of lungs collapsing and heart stopping. And the US has
> repeatedly scored way higher than Iran in the global executions stake.
No disagreement from me on the horrors of the U.S. love for capital punishment (or the penchant to criminalize and incarcerate). What annoys me are the repeated assertions coming from some quarters that having an avowedly anti-imperialist government with a populist who mouths ineffectual populist rhetoric makes a society somehow good or admirable.
Doug