Crush Liberalism

Justice Stevens turned against death penalty when we killed Pearl Harbor architect

Wow.  Just “wow”!  Just when I thought these bedwetting liberals on the Supreme Court couldn’t appall me any more than they already do, I read this:

[Justice Stevens] won a bronze star for his [World War II] service as a cryptographer, after he helped break the code that informed American officials that Adm. Isoroku Yamamoto, the commander of the Japanese Navy and architect of the Pearl Harbor attack, was about to travel to the front. Based on the code-breaking of Stevens and others, U.S. pilots, on Roosevelt’s orders, shot down Yamamoto’s plane in April 1943.

Stevens told me he was troubled by the fact that Yamamoto, a highly intelligent officer who had lived in the United States and become friends with American officers, was shot down with so little apparent deliberation or humanitarian consideration. The experience, he said, raised questions in his mind about the fairness of the death penalty. “I was on the desk, on watch, when I got word that they had shot down Yamamoto in the Solomon Islands, and I remember thinking: This is a particular individual they went out to intercept,” he said. “There is a very different notion when you’re thinking about killing an individual, as opposed to killing a soldier in the line of fire.” Stevens said that, partly as a result of his World War II experience, he has tried on the court to narrow the category of offenders who are eligible for the death penalty and to ensure that it is imposed fairly and accurately. He has been the most outspoken critic of the death penalty on the current court. 

Oh. My. God.

Eugene Volokh has several reasons as to why this is a preposterous, absurd view to take, especially the fact that Yamamoto was a military target who had masterminded the “9/11 of the time” at Pearl Harbor.  But I was perplexed as to how Stevens could possibly connect the targeting of a military commander with the American death penalty.  Volokh does a great job expanding on that:

And where exactly is the connection to the death penalty? Consider the chief arguments against the death penalty: the person being executed might be innocent; it’s just wrong for the state to kill people; others can be kept equally safe by locking the person up for life; the death penalty is likely to be applied in arbitrary or prejudiced ways. None of them work here. 

Indeed, good and decent people have legitimate concerns with the death penalty, most of which for the reasons that are outlined above.  However, none of those reasons are pertinent in the discussion about Yamamoto! Ponders Ace:

Wonder what Stevens thought about our “execution” of al Zarqawi, and how much he regrets not being able to sign a stay of execution for this wonderful man.

Stevens is no spring chicken, and will likely hang it up in the next term or two.  The thought of a younger Stevens getting put onto the Supreme Court is terrifying, which is why it is so important not to let the left regain the keys to the Oval Office.

October 31, 2007 - Posted by crushliberalism | moonbats, Supreme Court