Let me start this diary by saying that I am personally 100% opposed to the death penalty. For the reason that it is cruel and won't prevent most of the crimes in question.
But.
Just as a thought experiment:
Will a Goldman Sachs or Bank of America manager really risk his life on defrauding his company by a couple million dollars?
Lets face it: Corporate crimes might get you into jail. But those people have millions of dollars to hire the best lawyers in the country who will go from apppeal to appeal until their clients die of a natural cause.
Even if they are convicted they have the money to bribe the prison personnel, get special treatment and will probably be released early.
Even if they have thrown the whole country into the abyss.
People will have died because of their actions. The government spent less money on health prevention because of lacking funds. Medical facilities will not have been updated to current standards because the states are broke. Fewer police officers will patrol in certain neighborhoods cause nobody can pay for them in the necessary quantity. Teachers will be sacked and their salaries reduced resulting in less sex education, and thus more HIV infections. I could go on and on...
Indirectly those corporate criminals will be responsible for far more than a single life lost.
Where is the outrage? Why is nobody demanding the death penalty for them?
And if the death penalty would apply, wouldnt it be logical to apply to whole corporations too, since the Supreme Court has ruled, that they should be treated just like people?
If there is systematic and organized fraud in one of those banks, shouldnt it face its termination?
Just thinking out loud after I read the diary on Ted Kaufmans speech today.
If democrats would govern in the way they campaigned in 2008, nobody would talk about a republican majority. Where has the populist sentiment gone, that was such a centerpeace of Obamas campaign?
I want to say "Schweitzer/Boxer in 2016". But if things dont change I am mightily tempted to say "Schweitzer/Boxer in 2012".