>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>If someone commited a first degree murder on Adolf Hitler. Would you stil feel the same? How about a child killing in her father a first degree murder after she had been abused for a decade?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>There are too many levels of grey to draw a clear line.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>First, on the issue of a child killing a parent who had abused the child, in the U.S. it is extremely unlikely that the prosecution would go for first degree murder. There are precedents for such cases Your point isn't as valid as you think it is.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>On Hitler, that is a pure straw man fallacy. Walter, I'm sorry, but a guy as smart as you are on SQL Server sure initiates a number of fallacies. You and Jos are the same in that regard...you're good guys and very smart, but you raise many fallacies. Just pointing that out. But to answer your question, if it occurred during the period where Hitler was ordered the torture and death of innocent people, again we're talking about a different situation.
>>>>>
>>>>>You missed the point entirely. There are numerous shades of gray while you insist to see things black and white. Seeing the shades of grey is exactly why judges and juries exist, else we could write a computer program for it.
>>>>
>>>>...but as we know humans make mistakes....so knowing that it would seem logical not to impose a sentence that can not be corrected.
>>>
>>>Agreed
>>
>>The Netherlands gave up on death sentence in the late 1800's right?
>>
>>Rate of murders per 100,000 population
>> Netherlands 0.9
>> United States 4.8
>>
>>seems to me that Netherlands has a much better handle on things than we do in the USA...you'd think people would figure this out.
>
>We gave up on it in 1870, but in the aftermath of WWII some war criminals were executed.
>
>To my knowledge the US in the only western country still practising the death penalty is the US. I've outlined my standpoint on the UT many times, yes, I believe the US focus is too much on punishment rather than prevention and guiding people back into society. In terms of the murder rate, much can be contributed t the broad availability of guns in the US. We do not have a gun culture, nor most european countries. For the countries that do, you'll almost see consistently higher murder rate. Doing the stats there is a strong correlation between gun availability and murder rates.
>
>However, it does not mean there is no support for the death penalty here. Each time an incicent takes place with lunatics killing multiple people, you'll see a temporary spike for the support off the death penalty, but there is about no politician to find who would support it.

After Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people three years ago, I can't recall anyone wanting him killed, except foreigners.