Death of a Tyrant

Just in case anyone's been completely isolated from news today, Saddam Hussein was hanged this morning. I can only hope that this marks the closing of an era, but I'm not naive enough to assume that it will. It's interesting to me that a lot of people are debating whether this exectution was the "right" thing to do. I have no idea. But I do think it was a necessary thing to do. There are few cases where I can unequivocally support the death penalty. This is one of them. Why? Because there can be no doubt that Saddam was responsible for countless hideous acts, and I am firmly convinced that, for some acts, a person loses the right to live.

So you might find it odd to know that I do not support the death penalty as currently practiced in the United States. Why? Primarily, fair application. Given the same severity of crime, a black person is much more likely to receive the death penalty. This is unacceptable. I think that the only way to make the death penalty "fair" in that sense is to have a separate jury or group of judges who hear ONLY about the severity of the crimes and decide whether the crimes themselves warrant the death penalty. There are other problems besides fair application, though. Uppermost of those is the conviction and execution of innocents. No system is perfect, so there is no way to avoid that risk. Thus, in general, I oppose the death penalty. I make exception only for particularly heinous cases where the identity of the perpetrator is beyond any doubt.

One final thought. I said that Saddam's exectution was necessary, but made no claim that it was "right." It almost certainly was not. So how can it be necessary? Simple. It solved several problems. Saddam had committed so many crimes that to try every single one of them would take years. This involves court fees, as well as the price of room and board for one ex-dictator, and a thousand hells of media circuses. And all this happening in a less than stable country. His death solves all of that. I would liken it to Giles killing Ben at the end of Buffy's fifth season. It was certainly wrong. Ben wasn't exactly innocent at that point, but he was human. The "right" thing would have been to let him (and thereby Glory) live. It would also have been the stupid, impractical thing to do, as Ben/Glory would certainly have made problems later on. So the execution was necessary, even if "wrong."