Ellen Goodman: Tinkering with the machinery of death

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.daily-journal.com/archives/dj/display.php?id=405807

BOSTON -- So we have a national moratorium of sorts. An unofficial stay of execution. All quiet in the death chambers.

In the days since the Supreme Court decided to take on another death penalty case, 11 states -- including Texas, the capital of capital punishment -- have suspended executions.

But there isn't much hoopla among death penalty opponents or much anger among proponents. The case that will be heard this session isn't about the morality or constitutionality of the death penalty itself. It's about the way execution is executed.

The case brought by two death row inmates in Kentucky doesn't ask whether the death penalty constitutes "cruel and unusual punishment," but only whether lethal injection is cruel and unusual.

Is there something just a little chilling in this? A searing moral debate reduced to an argument about the details of injections, syringes, dosages, pain and the competence of executioners?

[Turbineguy]

1. It's a debate

and while it goes on, somebody on deathrow may be cleared of wrongdoing instead of executed.

Babysteps