Life Imprisonment Is Preferable to the Death Penalty
"Alternatives to the Death Penalty," www.cuadp.org, 2004. Copyright © 2004 by Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. Reproduced by permission.
Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty is an organization that is working to abolish executions in the United States through public education and grassroots activism.
Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (CUADP) recognizes and upholds the responsibility of society to protect everyone from people who are dangerous, in particular, those who are convicted murderers.
CUADP also understands the legitimate response of human nature to seek vengeance in the form of harsh punishment for persons who have committed violent crimes. CUADP believes that as a society we are obligated to do better than to respond with a gut primal response, regardless of how natural that response may feel.
CUADP is concerned that our justice system is currently a retributive justice system which only heightens the pain and deepens the wounds of the families of victims of murder, the families of perpetrators, and the perpetrators themselves. CUADP also recognizes the strong ability of human nature to change and heal.
CUADP is concerned about well-documented and indisputably persistent problems in the application of the death penalty and in the criminal justice system as a whole in the United States of America.
Bad Public Policy
CUADP calls attention to politicians who perpetuate a myth through their advocacy of the death penalty to demonstrate a "tough on crime" position on matters of public policy. To suggest that the death penalty is a deterrent to violent criminals and is a vehicle to somehow grant relief to the suffering of victims families is to deceive the constituents they serve.
CUADP calls on all citizens to urge their elected representatives to work towards violence prevention programs which identify and help "at-risk" youth and adults.
CUADP calls on all citizens to look beyond emotions and to learn the facts about how our system actually functions before deciding for themselves where they stand on the question of empowering the government to kill in their name.
Morally, socially and economically, the death penalty is a bad public policy. There is a better way.
A Viable Alternative
Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty advocates the following as a viable alternative to the death penalty:
Persons convicted of capital murder should serve a minimum of 25 years in prison before the possibility of consideration for parole. Please note: consideration for parole in no way suggests an inmate will receive parole. Parole boards must abide by strict but fair standards in deciding who should receive parole. The abolition of parole endangers prison workers.
In certain cases, imprisonment should be for life, With no possibility of parole—ever.
While in prison, prisoners should work in jobs which are not slave-like and allow for some dignity and purpose of life for the inmate. Such work situations create safer conditions for guards and others who work in prisons.
A portion of the prisoners' earnings should go to pay for their incarceration, and a portion should go into a fund for the victims of violent crime and their survivors. This would allow for a restitution fund for social, psychological and religious help for victims and survivor families. Such funds could also provide financial help for families which have lost a wage earner to murder.
CUADP supports the concept of restorative justice, including the bringing together of perpetrators and victims' family members by qualified professionals working with both, to help facilitate the process of reconciliation.
States Offering Life Without Parole
The following is a list of states which [as of 2004] have the death penalty and which also offer life without parole as a sentencing option. Currently there are NO states with an integrated restorative justice program which would allow convicted murderers to pay for their own incarceration or even to make restitutions directly to the survivors of their victims.
Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Federal Government, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, US Military, Utah, Virginia, Washington, Wyoming.
Total: 34 states.
[As of 2004] states with the death penalty but no provision for life without parole are Kansas, New Jersey, New Mexico & Texas.
Total: 4 states.
The people want alternatives. "Tough on crime" prosecutors do not.
To Wit: "You're not going to find 12 people back-to-back on the same jury that are going to kill somebody when the alternative is throwing away the key," [according to Harris County, Texas, District Attorney Johnny Holmes].
To many innocent people are being put to death.
- The general public
- A broken Capital Punishment system must be fixed
- The writers voice sounds desperate
Writing Strategy Questions:
1) How do we know that the death penalty system is broken?
2) How can we make sure that the person who has been convicted is really guilty
3) Instead of the death penalty/Capital Punishment, maybe our judicial system should consider life in prison without parole.
Exploring Ideas and Questions:
1) How do we, as a society, be sure that Capital Punishment is a deteruant for convicted murders
2) If the Capital Punishment system is broken, what can we do to fix it
3) How can we be sure if a convicted murder is truly guilty?
Ideas for writing:
1) When should Capital Punishment be the final asnwer to a herrific crime; lets make sure the system works
2) Examining whether life in prison without the possibility of parole is an alternative to Capital Punishment
Monday, August 11, 2008
Colab Blog
Overpopulation Is a Serious Problem
Yellow=Thesis
Green= Radical Claims
Blue= Conventional Thinking
Table of Contents: Further Readings
Frosty Wooldridge, "Plague of the 21st Century: America’s Overpopulation," Washington Dispatch, March 5, 2004. Copyright © 2004 by the Washington Dispatch. Reproduced by permission of the author.
Overpopulation is rapidly depleting the earth's resources, Frosty Wooldridge contends in the following viewpoint. In the United States overpopulation has resulted in traffic congestion, poverty, and environmental devastation, he claims. Wooldridge warns that failure to control population now will result in horrific population problems for future generations (THESIS). Frosty Wooldridge is a teacher and population activist. He is also the author of Incursion into America: Immigration's Unarmed Invasion—Deadly Consequences.
As you read, consider the following questions:
1. According to Wooldridge, how many people are added to the U.S. population every year?
2. Name two of the consequences the author argues are the result of overpopulation.
3. Which three countries does Wooldridge argue ignored their population problem until they were unsolvable?
Albert Einstein wrote, "The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them." Nonetheless, governors, our president, Congress and other leaders stagger forward with 'solutions' that accelerate America's population problems.
In the past 10 years, the world added 880 million people. America added 33 million and California added six million—on its way from 35 million to 55 million in the next 30 years. Like California, many states found themselves inundated with sprawl, gridlock, rising home prices, new forms of crime and diseases. Today, America stands at 292 million and grows by 3.3 million per year. Just past the mid-century, America will add 200 million people.
Dwindling Resources
Soon past the mid-century, those added millions will be struggling for dwindling resources, water, food and a diminishing quality of life. In western states like California and Arizona, a drought in 2050 will become a disaster along with many other consequences.
For graphic examples, one need only look at India and China. In a recent speech, Arun Gandhi, grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, said, "In my country, 4 million people are born in the streets, live in the streets and die in the streets—never having used a toilet or shower." If massive population is so good, why is India so poor?
Overpopulation will become the 'plague of the 21st century.'
Where is America headed? Do we want such a legacy for our own children? According to 60 Minutes, we have one million homeless children struggling in our inner cities today. What will be the fate of another 200 million people who create homeless children? How many are too many and when will Americans address that fact? Which leader?
At this time—no one. Politicians scurry like cockroaches at the mention of population stabilization. Corporations demand larger markets as if nonrenewable resources will appear out of a magician's black hat. We're like a runaway freight train with no brakes headed toward the edge of the Grand Canyon.
Americans face consequences in every corner of our nation. Our East and West coasts, teeming with too many people, strive to deal with escalating water, air and land dilemmas. Acid rains pound our lakes with chemicals. Our cities create thick clouds where millions of children breathe carcinogens with every breath. Farmers kill microbes in the soil with fertilizers and pesticides—leaving us with contaminated foods for eating. Each year, 1.3 million new cancers are detected in our US citizens—an epidemic of our own making.
Eleanor Roosevelt said it 50 years ago; "We must prevent human tragedy rather than run around trying to save ourselves after an event has already occurred. Unfortunately, history clearly shows that we arrive at catastrophe by failing to meet the situation, by failing to act when we should have acted. The opportunity passes us by and the next disaster is always more difficult and compounded than the last one."
Immediate Action Is Necessary
By failing to act now, what kinds of consequences will we as a nation face when we hit 11/42 billion people? In the US with 200 million more people, that's 77% more traffic, 77% added planes in the air, 77% increased pollution, 77% faster uses of already limited resources like water and gasoline. With each new added American, 1 to 12.6 acres of wilderness is plowed up to support that person. In the next 10 years, according to the National Academy of Sciences, 2,500 plants and animals will become extinct in the USA because of habitat destruction via population growth. Why aren't we addressing the moral and biological consequences of such horrific extinction rates?
When you add global warming, ocean fisheries collapsing, acid rain, ozone destruction, drought, contaminated water supplies, poisoning and sterilization of the soils by insecticides and fertilizers—we're building unimaginable consequences.
How serious is our problem? Upon receiving the Sanger Award for Human Rights in 1966, Dr. Martin Luther King said, "... the plague of overpopulation is soluble by means we have discovered and with resources we possess. What is lacking is not sufficient knowledge of the solution, but universal consciousness of the gravity of the problems and the education of billions of people who are its victims."
Immigration Must Be Controlled
Fifty years ago, Bangladesh, India and China ignored their accelerating populations. Today, their problems are so gargantuan, they can't solve them. As if like lemmings, America's leaders follow the same steps. According to the Center for Immigration Studies, we're allowing the immigration of more than 2.3 million people annually from countries that refuse family planning. Since the American female has a fertility rate of 2.03 children, it's not Americans causing the rising population tide. We need immigration reform and reduction to less than 175,000 people annually before population momentum forces us into an unsustainable society. If we don't tame this 'immigration monster,' it will grow past our ability to manage it.
If we do nothing, we commit our children and all living things to a difficult future by not addressing overpopulation in 2003. It's a disservice to ourselves, our nation and future generations.
4. Wrie two “ideas for writing” such as the ones following the essay in this book, for the text that you found.
1. What major problem has a simple solution?
Population control is a major problem that can be sovled by liminting the reproduction of humans.
2. Why don’t we improve our institutions and therfore our lives, even though we now process a great deal of hard information about ourselves?
I believe we don’t improve our instititutions because we are living in the moment of now. Most people don’t think about the future and how are actions will affect the future.
Yellow=Thesis
Green= Radical Claims
Blue= Conventional Thinking
Table of Contents: Further Readings
Frosty Wooldridge, "Plague of the 21st Century: America’s Overpopulation," Washington Dispatch, March 5, 2004. Copyright © 2004 by the Washington Dispatch. Reproduced by permission of the author.
Overpopulation is rapidly depleting the earth's resources, Frosty Wooldridge contends in the following viewpoint. In the United States overpopulation has resulted in traffic congestion, poverty, and environmental devastation, he claims. Wooldridge warns that failure to control population now will result in horrific population problems for future generations (THESIS). Frosty Wooldridge is a teacher and population activist. He is also the author of Incursion into America: Immigration's Unarmed Invasion—Deadly Consequences.
As you read, consider the following questions:
1. According to Wooldridge, how many people are added to the U.S. population every year?
2. Name two of the consequences the author argues are the result of overpopulation.
3. Which three countries does Wooldridge argue ignored their population problem until they were unsolvable?
Albert Einstein wrote, "The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them." Nonetheless, governors, our president, Congress and other leaders stagger forward with 'solutions' that accelerate America's population problems.
In the past 10 years, the world added 880 million people. America added 33 million and California added six million—on its way from 35 million to 55 million in the next 30 years. Like California, many states found themselves inundated with sprawl, gridlock, rising home prices, new forms of crime and diseases. Today, America stands at 292 million and grows by 3.3 million per year. Just past the mid-century, America will add 200 million people.
Dwindling Resources
Soon past the mid-century, those added millions will be struggling for dwindling resources, water, food and a diminishing quality of life. In western states like California and Arizona, a drought in 2050 will become a disaster along with many other consequences.
For graphic examples, one need only look at India and China. In a recent speech, Arun Gandhi, grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, said, "In my country, 4 million people are born in the streets, live in the streets and die in the streets—never having used a toilet or shower." If massive population is so good, why is India so poor?
Overpopulation will become the 'plague of the 21st century.'
Where is America headed? Do we want such a legacy for our own children? According to 60 Minutes, we have one million homeless children struggling in our inner cities today. What will be the fate of another 200 million people who create homeless children? How many are too many and when will Americans address that fact? Which leader?
At this time—no one. Politicians scurry like cockroaches at the mention of population stabilization. Corporations demand larger markets as if nonrenewable resources will appear out of a magician's black hat. We're like a runaway freight train with no brakes headed toward the edge of the Grand Canyon.
Americans face consequences in every corner of our nation. Our East and West coasts, teeming with too many people, strive to deal with escalating water, air and land dilemmas. Acid rains pound our lakes with chemicals. Our cities create thick clouds where millions of children breathe carcinogens with every breath. Farmers kill microbes in the soil with fertilizers and pesticides—leaving us with contaminated foods for eating. Each year, 1.3 million new cancers are detected in our US citizens—an epidemic of our own making.
Eleanor Roosevelt said it 50 years ago; "We must prevent human tragedy rather than run around trying to save ourselves after an event has already occurred. Unfortunately, history clearly shows that we arrive at catastrophe by failing to meet the situation, by failing to act when we should have acted. The opportunity passes us by and the next disaster is always more difficult and compounded than the last one."
Immediate Action Is Necessary
By failing to act now, what kinds of consequences will we as a nation face when we hit 11/42 billion people? In the US with 200 million more people, that's 77% more traffic, 77% added planes in the air, 77% increased pollution, 77% faster uses of already limited resources like water and gasoline. With each new added American, 1 to 12.6 acres of wilderness is plowed up to support that person. In the next 10 years, according to the National Academy of Sciences, 2,500 plants and animals will become extinct in the USA because of habitat destruction via population growth. Why aren't we addressing the moral and biological consequences of such horrific extinction rates?
When you add global warming, ocean fisheries collapsing, acid rain, ozone destruction, drought, contaminated water supplies, poisoning and sterilization of the soils by insecticides and fertilizers—we're building unimaginable consequences.
How serious is our problem? Upon receiving the Sanger Award for Human Rights in 1966, Dr. Martin Luther King said, "... the plague of overpopulation is soluble by means we have discovered and with resources we possess. What is lacking is not sufficient knowledge of the solution, but universal consciousness of the gravity of the problems and the education of billions of people who are its victims."
Immigration Must Be Controlled
Fifty years ago, Bangladesh, India and China ignored their accelerating populations. Today, their problems are so gargantuan, they can't solve them. As if like lemmings, America's leaders follow the same steps. According to the Center for Immigration Studies, we're allowing the immigration of more than 2.3 million people annually from countries that refuse family planning. Since the American female has a fertility rate of 2.03 children, it's not Americans causing the rising population tide. We need immigration reform and reduction to less than 175,000 people annually before population momentum forces us into an unsustainable society. If we don't tame this 'immigration monster,' it will grow past our ability to manage it.
If we do nothing, we commit our children and all living things to a difficult future by not addressing overpopulation in 2003. It's a disservice to ourselves, our nation and future generations.
4. Wrie two “ideas for writing” such as the ones following the essay in this book, for the text that you found.
1. What major problem has a simple solution?
Population control is a major problem that can be sovled by liminting the reproduction of humans.
2. Why don’t we improve our institutions and therfore our lives, even though we now process a great deal of hard information about ourselves?
I believe we don’t improve our instititutions because we are living in the moment of now. Most people don’t think about the future and how are actions will affect the future.
Group Minds
I think many people like to be in groups because they are afraid to speak for themselves. They use the group to speak out for them. So for these people it doesn't really bother them too much, being controlled or manipulated by the group has no effect on them. Maybe they are just depressed so they are temporally following the group. And for others, they just like to be around people, they might agree with what the group says or does but it doesn't mean they are being run by the group. But then there are a select few who are afraid to stand out. Those are the weak people, who just need a little more confidence and motivation. But I think its necessary to be apart of some group no matter what.
Why Doesnt GM Sell Crack
WOW!! Michael Moore is a genius, I totally agree with him 100%. I have never thought about this the way he has. After reading this article, it surprised me that his ideas aren't laws yet. He makes an amazingly good point when he brings up the whole crack argument. He busted out the guy on the airplane too, I thought that was really funny. I would support a law like that without a second thought. It would be a huge benefit for the American society as a whole. Well maybe not for those greedy CEO bastards. This essay was amazing, is is by far the best one in this book.
Farming and Global Community
The author has a great point of view on this topic. The world would be am much better place if good healthy food was cheaper. In all honesty the only way to this would happen is if the big corporate industries would sell farming equipment cheaper. Then the farmers could sell us food at a cheaper price. But we all know this would never because the corporations would never sell out. These huge corporations are out there to make money not cater to the public needs. Cooperation's have no reason to sell the products at a lower price. Farmers do hella farming work and should deserve more respect than they actually get. Everyone in this country eats their food weather its produce or meat.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
Is Hunting Ethical?
In my opinion hunting is ethical. Hunting has always been in mans life. For many it means good food and a great kill. If we were killing and throwing meat away then there would be a problem. Yeah people hunt for fun, but they also eat the kill. I haven't met anyone who hasn't eatin their kill. Its a form pride and accomplishment to share your tasty kill. If hunting wasn't allowed then some animals would be way over populated. Population control, that is another way of looking at the situation. This benefits us in many ways.
Response to Juliet Schor
Buying a big house, toys, and expensive things is the typical "American Dream". I believe that this has become a huge trend for most of America. It would be really hard or maybe even imposable to change that trend. This is how people show their success and wealth, its a status symbol that many people work hard to achieve. On the other hand I think its possible to start heading towards an earth friendly future. This is a realist change that is necessary to make the world a better place.
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