Posted by
VBushmills on Tuesday, November 10, 2009 8:36:54 AM
Richmond, November 10th, 2009
As you know, John Mohammed, the so-called "D.C. Sniper", is scheduled to be executed this evening at 9 PM. The US Supreme Court has already refused to intervene. As expected, various groups have appealed to Virginia governor Tim Kaine, himself in his last days in quite a different context, to commute the execution.
For as long as I can remember, executions have been carried out in a rather predictable and ordinary fashion.
Around the place of execution people gather, some with placards, others simply to pray, depending on whether their bias against the death penalty is political or religious in nature.
But also, depending on the kind of killer being executed, there is also a counter demonstration, sometimes, in part by aggrieved family and friends, still others with their own political ax to grind, such as making executions public. And then there are those little groups of creeps who truly want to celebrate a good hanging.
Nowhere to be seen, ever, is the one man or woman who have the actual power to not kill this man. The power to commute also carries with it the power to kill be refusing to commute.
This isn't distended logic. It simply reflects a solemnity about the taking of lief that people in positions of majesty seem to overlook. Of all the dark duties the state must carry out, (at least until they discovered enslaving the people and taking all their money can be made legal), putting a man or woman to death has to be at the top.
It would seem to me that the place of execution is the only place for that one person to be...and that his/her demeanor and dress should reflect not just the sobriety of the occasion, but the great weight that an executive carries by not stopping this horrible killing of another human being.
Carrying an open Bible would be nice. Me, I'd be with the Catholics, joining them in prayer for the soul of the soon-to-be-departed, as well as my own. Maybe someone would think to prayer for the governor's strength.
Just a thought.
VB