Ok. Good luck writing that new constitution and getting it ratified.

What a stupid thing to write. The government should never, ever have the authority to torture anyone for any reason. The Justice System is not an instrument of vengeance, nor should it be.

#8, "Torture, as a formal punishment, needs to be legalized"

#11:Ok. Good luck writing that new constitution and getting it ratified.

It doesn't need to be in the constitution. Torture is euphemismized as "advanced interrogation techniques" and the feds have proven that the constitution is worth jack and squat.

JOKE:
Q: What's the best thing about emo cake?
A: It cuts itself.

You could even keep them alive by feeding the bits back to them.

Not joking. People like this make me want to douse the world in gasoline.

#11, "Ok. Good luck writing that new constitution and getting it ratified."

#14, "It doesn't need to be in the constitution. Torture is euphemismized as "advanced interrogation techniques" and the feds have proven that the constitution is worth jack and squat."

Right, because if the executive does it, that makes it legal. Who are you, Richard Nixon?

I'm pretty sure the original poster meant legal as in, "The constitution and federal statutes define what is legal" and not as in, "John Yoo is a legal scholar."

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2004309593_apultimatefightingkids.html

Maybe I am naive, but I fail to see how nutjobs like yourself could hold power through legal means long enough to stack the Supreme Court into reinterpreting "cruel and unusual punishment" to exclude all of the delightfully nasty torture techniques to which you seem to enjoy jerking off.

You must lay in your bed at night seething about how the Bill of Rights has a liberal bias.

With shows like "Oz", movies like Shawshank, and a steady stream of news stories about prison life, you would think that people would know that prison might not just be time alone in a cell.

What more can we do to let potential criminals know what's in store for them? Nothing, because they don't care.

That's very generous of you to credit liberals with the 15+ year decline in the national crime rate that we've experienced recently.

Umm...the idea that criminal acts have become more gruesome over time is just plain counter to historical evidence.

Fists and boots. We should be so lucky.

If you saw this scenario happening here, if you were the bystander who called the police but knew they wouldn't be here till too late, and someone is being killed right in front of you: what would you do?

First, I'm not advocating torture, so let's get that out of the way. Gomez is crazy.

But I'd argue that the justice system is (or should be) a formal, organized system for exacting revenge that is FAIR. After all, if you look up "revenge" or "vengeance" in the dictionary it just says something like "inflicting punishment in return for injury."

That covers all kinds of acts. Some of them can be "just" (i.e. publicly accusing and embarrassing the guy who raped you) and some unjust (i.e. beating the shit out of your girlfriend because she broke up with you). Both of these are acts of vengeance, but one is reasonable and one is not.

The justice system exists to address the natural punitive impulse we have when we feel we have been wronged, but it takes out the PERSONAL and often over-reactive element of vengeance by having a jury, an impartial judge passing the sentence instead of the plaintiff, blah blah.

At least, that's the idea. I think any discussion of justice as a "rehabilitative" agent without the concept of punishment coming first is bound to miss the mark. Vengeance is important to people, and we need to have a system that gives it to them in a fair, dignified manner.

The concept of rehabilitation is a band aid for the problem, and this nation has multiple stab wounds.