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Four Charged in Alleged Synagogue Bomb Plot

Agent Ferris

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Four Charged in Alleged Synagogue Bomb Plot

Men Allegedly Bought Stinger Missile, C-4 Explosives Through FBI Informant

Four men who allegedly plotted to blow up a New York synagogue and shoot military planes at an upstate New York Air National Guard base were arrested tonight by the FBI on charges including plotting to use weapons of mass destruction within the United States.

Four Charged in Alleged Synagogue Bomb Plot - ABC News

Damn FBI infringing upon the rights of this oppressed minority to murder Jews, hopefully the ACLU will be providing them with the best representation money can buy.
 
I do not understand our laws. These guys are simply facing life in prison. They should be facing execution. Why keep them around for tax payers to cover the bill for maintaining their worthless lives.
 
I do not understand our laws. These guys are simply facing life in prison. They should be facing execution. Why keep them around for tax payers to cover the bill for maintaining their worthless lives.

Executions in this country are more costly than life sentences.
 
Damn FBI infringing upon the rights of this oppressed minority to murder Jews, hopefully the ACLU will be providing them with the best representation money can buy.

These guys will be sympathetic pop icons with book deals by the time the ACLU and the far left is done.
 
What exactly do you bring up the ACLU? The article made no mention of them. Second of all, these men have a right to legal representation, as required by our laws. In our adversarial system, a lawyer is duty bound to aid their client to the best of their ability.

I really don't see what you are whining about. I see no reason why these men aren't going to end up in nice prison cell where they can't hurt anyone.
 
That is only due to the appeal system. Reform is much needed.

It doesn't matter what the reason is. What we have is what we have, so it's cheaper to feed and clothe them than it is to off them.
 
It doesn't matter what the reason is. What we have is what we have, so it's cheaper to feed and clothe them than it is to off them.

I believe that you are offering a false choice.

Dudley Sharp, Death Penalty Resources Director of Justice For All (JFA), in an Oct. 1, 1997 Justice for All presentation titled "Death Penalty and Sentencing Information," wrote:
"Many opponents present, as fact, that the cost of the death penalty is so expensive (at least $2 million per case?), that we must choose life without parole ('LWOP') at a cost of $1 million for 50 years. Predictably, these pronouncements may be entirely false. JFA estimates that LWOP cases will cost $1.2 million - $3.6 million more than equivalent death penalty cases.

There is no question that the up front costs of the death penalty are significantly higher than for equivalent LWOP cases. There also appears to be no question that, over time, equivalent LWOP cases are much more expensive... than death penalty cases. Opponents ludicrously claim that the death penalty costs, over time, 3-10 times more than LWOP."


Oct. 1, 1997 - Dudley Sharp


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Chris Clem, JD, Attorney at Samples, Jennings, Ray & Clem, PLLC, in a Jan. 31, 2002 statement in response to a press release about the cost of capital cases as reported by the Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing, stated:
"Executions do not have to cost that much. We could hang them and re-use the rope. No cost! Or we could use firing squads and ask for volunteer firing squad members who would provide their own guns and ammunition. Again, no cost."


Jan. 31, 2002 - Chris Clem, JD


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Edwin Sutherland, PhD, late President of the American Sociological Society, and Donald R. Cressey, PhD, late Professor of Sociology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, in the 1974 revised edition of their book titled Criminology, wrote:
"[The] cost is not inherent in the [death] penalty, but imposed by judges. It is not cheaper to keep a criminal confined, because most of the time he will appeal just as much causing as many costs as a convict under death sentence. Being alive and having nothing better to do, he will spend his time in prison conceiving of ever-new habeas corpus petitions, which being unlimited, in effect cannot be rejected as res judicata. The cost is higher."


1974 - Edwin H. Sutherland, PhD
Donald R. Cressey, PhD


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Riptide, a Welcome to nV News - An NVIDIA Fansite forum blogger in a Dec. 18, 2007 answer to "whats your stance on the death penalty?", stated:
"Firing squad... You want cheap execution? There you go. If the first shot doesn't do it, the second will. And what does a couple rifle cartridges cost? $1.00?"


Dec. 18, 2007 - Riptide
 
It doesn't matter what the reason is. What we have is what we have, so it's cheaper to feed and clothe them than it is to off them.

Buried way down below all the so called facts, behind these outrageous costs, is the element of innocent people being put to death, just often enough, to keep the "appeal process laws", some of the most powerful and expensive laws on earth.

Granting everyone the rights to appeal even in the face of multiple murders in front of cameras, millions watching,...etc, etc.... We could cut the cost of the death penalty, significantly, by putting this type of murderer to death very quickly. No appeals...just a cursery discovery of whether this person, savy enough to set up the crime, load 8 weapons, and wear his or her vest, and cooly keep shooting,... is insane or not.

LWOP costs could be cut by similar application of change to the laws protecting the other murderers (LWOPers) rights behind bars.

Figured into these ridiculous cost assesments, is all the other costs of operating a prison. Such as housing dangerous criminals like those who sell pot... :doh Legalize...cut costs.
5% of the global population lives in the US ( by one recent accounting), while 25% of the worlds imprissoned are in US prisons, and NO we are no less a criminal contaminated society.

Just one more thought.... Lock up ALL of the whitecollar criminals, take the 1.4 trillion dollars, ( by one recent accounting) from their criminal activities, and run the prison system off that money. :mrgreen: Now thats what I call economic recovery.
 
Buried way down below all the so called facts, behind these outrageous costs, is the element of innocent people being put to death, just often enough, to keep the "appeal process laws", some of the most powerful and expensive laws on earth.

..and that's why I oppose the death penalty. There are too many damned mistakes. People are too quick to kill and they look upon innocent victims of the death penalty as collateral damage. Pretty sickening.
 
What is ignored in those calculations is the fact that the death penalty has a significant deterrent effect.

Even if we agree that executions "cost" more than life without parole, is that extra $1m saved worth the loss of 3-18 lives?

From that article:

There is also a classic economics question lurking in the background, Professor Wolfers said. “Capital punishment is very expensive,” he said, “so if you choose to spend money on capital punishment you are choosing not to spend it somewhere else, like policing.”

A single capital litigation can cost more than $1 million. It is at least possible that devoting that money to crime prevention would prevent more murders than whatever number, if any, an execution would deter.

....

The available data is nevertheless thin, mostly because there are so few executions.

In 2003, for instance, there were more than 16,000 homicides but only 153 death sentences and 65 executions.

“It seems unlikely,” Professor Donohue and Professor Wolfers concluded in their Stanford article, “that any study based only on recent U.S. data can find a reliable link between homicide and execution rates.”

The two professors offered one particularly compelling comparison. Canada has executed no one since 1962. Yet the murder rates in the United States and Canada have moved in close parallel since then, including before, during and after the four-year death penalty moratorium in the United States in the 1970s.
 
From that article:

Not sure what you think that proves.

There were twelve independent studies conducted by people who were not exactly death penalty advocates and they unanimously found a significant deterrent effect. I don't see how one article written by pissed off law profs means anything, especially with such a tenuous argument.
 
Not sure what you think that proves.

There were twelve independent studies conducted by people who were not exactly death penalty advocates and they unanimously found a significant deterrent effect. I don't see how one article written by pissed off law profs means anything, especially with such a tenuous argument.

It means that saying the death penalty may deter homicides is fallacious and irrelevant because:

1. There is over 45 years evidence to the contrary from our northern neighbors.

2. Money that can be saved from removing capital punishment can be used for 'policing' and stop more homicides that may or may not have been deterred by the application of capital punishment.
 
It means that saying the death penalty may deter homicides is fallacious and irrelevant because:

1. There is over 45 years evidence to the contrary from our northern neighbors.

This relies on several enormous assumptions

a) that homicide trends in Canada are directly tied to homicide trends here
b) that if not for the death penalty, the trends would remain exactly the same
c) that the statistical analysis of these two angry profs is unassailable despite being undisclosed

I just think it's laughable to use Canadian homicide trends to try to prove something about the success of US policing tactics.

2. Money that can be saved from removing capital punishment can be used for 'policing' and stop more homicides that may or may not have been deterred by the application of capital punishment.

Again, this relies on additional unsupported assumptions.

As the article notes, there are around 65 executions per year. Even if we take the "$1m savings" number at face value, do you really think that $65m is going to have even the most infinitesimal impact on homicide rates across the country? That will just about pay for some new radios and community awareness training for the cops in some podunk town.
 
This relies on several enormous assumptions

a) that homicide trends in Canada are directly tied to homicide trends here
b) that if not for the death penalty, the trends would remain exactly the same
c) that the statistical analysis of these two angry profs is unassailable despite being undisclosed

I just think it's laughable to use Canadian homicide trends to try to prove something about the success of US policing tactics.



Again, this relies on additional unsupported assumptions.

As the article notes, there are around 65 executions per year. Even if we take the "$1m savings" number at face value, do you really think that $65m is going to have even the most infinitesimal impact on homicide rates across the country? That will just about pay for some new radios and community awareness training for the cops in some podunk town.

The idea is the death penalty deters homicides, which is what you asserted.

Do we see the death penalty deterring people from killing each other? No.

Each one of those studies followed only two variables.
 
The idea is the death penalty deters homicides, which is what you asserted.

Do we see the death penalty deterring people from killing each other? No.

Each one of those studies followed only two variables.

You're kidding me, right? Because people still kill each other, the death penalty doesn't work?

Further, I didn't assert **** - a dozen independent statistical analyses asserted this. Where did you get the idea that these studies followed only two variables? Did you read the article?
 
You're kidding me, right? Because people still kill each other, the death penalty doesn't work?
Where did I say that? I said we don't physically see it deterring homicides.
Further, I didn't assert **** - a dozen independent statistical analyses asserted this. Where did you get the idea that these studies followed only two variables? Did you read the article?
You asserted it here, by which I mean you brought it up here.

That article said each variable they looked at, # of executions by location and homicide rates over time in the same location.

What it doesn't tell you is that homicide rates in non-death penalty states have remained consistently lower than in death penalty states, with the gap growing in difference over the past two decades.

I find it laughable you think studies by economists on false premises have a proper role in political and criminal science.
 
Where did I say that? I said we don't physically see it deterring homicides.

What are you basing this conclusion on? The fact that people still kill each other?

How would you expect to "physically see" it deterring homicides?

That article said each variable they looked at, # of executions by location and homicide rates over time in the same location.

No, that's not it.

The studies, performed by economists in the past decade, compare the number of executions in different jurisdictions with homicide rates over time — while trying to eliminate the effects of crime rates, conviction rates and other factors — and say that murder rates tend to fall as executions rise. One influential study looked at 3,054 counties over two decades.

It's not just plotting an x and y chart - there's a bit more to it than that. Read a few of the actual studies.

What it doesn't tell you is that homicide rates in non-death penalty states have remained consistently lower than in death penalty states, with the gap growing in difference over the past two decades.

You say that as if it means something.

I find it laughable you think studies by economists on false premises have a proper role in political and criminal science.

I'm just amazed that you don't seem to understand why the things you keep bringing up are non-responsive to the studies I referenced.
 
It doesn't matter what the reason is. What we have is what we have, so it's cheaper to feed and clothe them than it is to off them.
See, there is your problem, feeding and clothing them. Lock them up securely, then just ignore them, and they'll go away.
 
I find it laughable you think studies by economists on false premises have a proper role in political and criminal science.
Don't laugh too hard. IIRC... Right has a Law degree. He certainly knows the legal stuff and is excellent at providing pertinint citations.
 
RightinNYC said:
What are you basing this conclusion on? The fact that people still kill each other?

How would you expect to "physically see" it deterring homicides?
No, the fact that the rate of homicide is and has been growing lower in non-death penalty states. Should I make the claim that life imprisonment deters homicide more than the death penalty? I am only presenting evidence that doesn't support a faulty a premise.


RightinNYC said:
It's not just plotting an x and y chart - there's a bit more to it than that. Read a few of the actual studies.
I've read most of them. All it is a few pro-death penalty trying to stir up something before the Supreme Court makes the decision next year on lethal injections.

(Also, what you had made bold - not quoted above - are all variables they eliminated. Thanks for proving my point on this controlled study.)

RightinNYC said:
You say that as if it means something.
Great rhetoric. I didn't expect anything better when presented with evidence against the death penalty deterring homicides.

RightinNYC[ I'm just amazed that you don't seem to understand why the things you keep bringing up are non-responsive to the studies I referenced.[/quote said:
I'm just amazed you think studies on faulty premises is worthy evidence for the death penalty deterring homicides.

Don't laugh too hard. IIRC... Right has a Law degree. He certainly knows the legal stuff and is excellent at providing pertinint citations.

He's not the only one ;)
 
No, the fact that the rate of homicide is and has been growing lower in non-death penalty states.

You keep missing a pretty fundamental point - the fact that X happens does not mean that Y caused it. Say NY passes a law next year that says that all convicted felons are required to have handguns. If the economy gets significantly better, causing the homicide rate to fall, does that mean that giving guns to felons saves lives?

In order to prove that the homicide rate was decreasing because of giving guns to felons, I would have to conduct a study that would correct for all the externalities. Which is exactly what was done here. 12 times.

Should I make the claim that life imprisonment deters homicide more than the death penalty?

Sure, if you can support it.

I am only presenting evidence that doesn't support a faulty a premise.

?

I've read most of them. All it is a few pro-death penalty trying to stir up something before the Supreme Court makes the decision next year on lethal injections.

No, it's really not. Again, did you even read the article or are you just making this up?

First, the studies were published between 2003 and 2006, which means they were started significantly before that. Amazing how they were able to predict that the SC was going to "make the decision" on lethal injections in 2009.

Second, take a look at some of the statements of the authors:

“I personally am opposed to the death penalty,” said H. Naci Mocan, an economist at Louisiana State University and an author of a study finding that each execution saves five lives. “But my research shows that there is a deterrent effect.”

“I am definitely against the death penalty on lots of different grounds,” said Joanna M. Shepherd, a law professor at Emory with a doctorate in economics who wrote or contributed to several studies. “But I do believe that people respond to incentives.”

Sure sounds like they're just trying to justify it.

But wait, there's more:

“The evidence on whether it has a significant deterrent effect seems sufficiently plausible that the moral issue becomes a difficult one,” said Cass R. Sunstein, a law professor at the University of Chicago who has frequently taken liberal positions. “I did shift from being against the death penalty to thinking that if it has a significant deterrent effect it’s probably justified.”

Professor Sunstein and Adrian Vermeule, a law professor at Harvard, wrote in their own Stanford Law Review article that “the recent evidence of a deterrent effect from capital punishment seems impressive, especially in light of its ‘apparent power and unanimity,’ ” quoting a conclusion of a separate overview of the evidence in 2005 by Robert Weisberg, a law professor at Stanford, in the Annual Review of Law and Social Science.

“Capital punishment may well save lives,” the two professors continued. “Those who object to capital punishment, and who do so in the name of protecting life, must come to terms with the possibility that the failure to inflict capital punishment will fail to protect life.”

Yea, that's that noted arch-conservative [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cass_Sunstein"]Cass Sunstein[/ame]. What a right-wing nutjob.

(Also, what you had made bold - not quoted above - are all variables they eliminated. Thanks for proving my point on this controlled study.)

They didn't "eliminate" them as you're insinuating, they corrected for them. They're a critically important part of the study.

Great rhetoric. I didn't expect anything better when presented with evidence against the death penalty deterring homicides.

I'm being 100% serious when I'm saying that that factoid, if true, still means nothing. Causation =/= correlation.

I'm just amazed you think studies on faulty premises is worthy evidence for the death penalty deterring homicides.

You still haven't identified a single faulty premise. So far you've:

-Said they were invalid because of Canadian homicide data,
-Said they were invalid because you can't "physically see" it, and
-Said they were invalid because homicide rates are lower in non-death penalty states
 
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4 not smarter than a 5th grade zuccinni squash!

I read the eatils as to how these bozo's were played with by the FBI and it appears that they may or may not be smarter than a 5th grade zuccinni squash!
 
You don't understand our laws

I do not understand our laws. These guys are simply facing life in prison. They should be facing execution. Why keep them around for tax payers to cover the bill for maintaining their worthless lives.

conspiracy for terrorism is not unfortunately a capital offense. It should be!
 
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