Seriously?

My friend's dad is a defense attorney for capital punishment cases. He almost never wins because he takes on the toughest cases, but he's a great guy. I'm not a fan of, you know, murderers and such, but capital punishment is so ridiculously inefficient at achieving any of its aims (except for maybe satisfying the victim's family, but after 20 years they've gone through the heartache of the capital process as well) that it's difficult to comprehend why it's still around.

Tina's dad was interviewed a couple of years ago on a network news station - so forgive the clumsy transcript - about one of his clients, a 75 year old deaf and blind guy in a wheelchair who has had a stroke and a heart attack in his many decades of incarceration.

A quote from the reporter: "I don't know how to say this, you know, but in September he had a bad heart attack and the state of California spent an awful lot of money and time trying to save his life and now in January they're going to spend money trying to end his life. I mean it's bizarre."

UM YES IT IS asd;klfjas;lfkj!