[mburbank]

1.) I am personally, morally opposed to the government having the power to take peoples lives.

2.) I do not believe that when governments have such an extreme power that it will not be at best handled carelessly and at worst abused.

3.) I do not believe that our justice system can ever represent the rich and poor equally. This is something one has to live with, but I am not prepared o give the power of life and death over to a system which values the rich over the poor.

4.) If one innocent person is executed, that's too much. There is no reprieve from execution. You can't let a man out of execution if new evidence is dicovered.

5.) Finding a crime particularly repugnant is not a reason to desire the ultimate penalty. A child molester who gets life without parole is no more capable of molesting children than a dead child molester. If however, it turned out at some later date that the person in question was innocent, you can't ressurect them.

6.) Any crime the brings out such viceral, primal desire for retribuition is ripe for witch hunting, and it's happened. In the 1980's in Massachusettes and entire group of people went to jail, some of them for decades, when the evidence clearly showed (and it is now widely agreed) they were innocent.

Before you argue the particulars with me, I will restate that I am against state sanctioned execution in all cases. At base, I believe it is wrong to take a human life, without exception.