Resolved: The United States Ought to Abolish the Death Penalty

Since they were copy/pasted, they didn't not bring over the entire address. I will address each point individually, then follow up with my own argument. But first, some definitions that were not provided. Cruel [1] - 1. Causing pain or suffering: "I can't stand people who are cruel to animals". 2. Having or showing a sadistic disregard for the pain or suffering of others. Since definition 1 is too vague to be applied (being arrested can cause pain, therefore it is cruel, and therefore, the government is not allowed to arrest criminals), and so definition 2 must be applied. Sadistic [2] - deriving pleasure or sexual gratification from inflicting pain on another. Unusual [3] - Not habitually or commonly occurring or done. Now, to the arguments. C1.1) the Methods of execution is questionable. Starting with the EC, my opponent makes the claim that "the prisoner's eyes often pop out. " This is a complete exageration. While it is noted that eyeballs "sometimes" pop out (as admitted by his own quote, not "often"), it is not common, nor is it the reason the blindfold is applied. The blindfold is applied (as with most physical executions, rather than chemical) so that people don't have to look at their eyes while executing. This has been seen with firing squads, hangings, decapitations, and even the LI (though it is a full sheet over their body, not just a blindfold). For the EC, most cases, a single jolt results in the cooking of the brain, leading to complete, near instant death [4]. While muscle may still spasm from the electric current, that is not a sign that the person is still alive, nor in pain. Once the brain is dead, the rest can do whatever. For LI, my opponent only listed one of the drugs, not all three. The three are [5] . .. 1) Sodium Thiopental (ST) 2) Pancuronium Bromide (PB) 3) Potassium Chloride (PC) My opponent claims that the dose of ST wears off after 7-10 minutes. I would like to see his source on this (since the sources were copied and pasted, the link does not go to the correct address), as I highly doubt it. There are several flaws with this statement. 1) The dose given of ST is well past the leathal dose as is, so it can't really "wear off. " And in fact, a single dose of ST will kill someone in about 10 minutes, as seen with Ken Biros [6]. 2) Since the dose of ST is so high, it doesn't wear off as fast as medical doses (which is what most pro-life websites compare to). 3) PC will kill within 2 minutes of injection, so the 7 - 10 minute mark doesn't even matter [5]. What does the UN have to say about this? I don't really care, as this debate is specifically about the US (as defined by my opponent in R1), not the UN. To my opponent's question to me, no this doesn't sound cruel at all. It actually sounds like one of the most peaceful ways anyone could possibly die. Where the only possible discomfort is that you may have to be poked multiple times to find a vein. Unless the medical team is intentionally poking someone multiple times for their own pleasure, this does not meet the definition of cruel. C1.2) There is no fool proof method of preventing a botched execution The "43" number needs to be critically looked at. Here are examples that "death penalty info" labels as "botched" [7]. Frank Coppola - Two electric shocks were administered. Stephen Peter Morin - Administers needed to seach for 45 minutes to find a vien to insert the needle (he was a massive drug user), but he was killed on first injection. Randy Woolls - Same as Morin. Wilbert Lee Evans - Took two shocks to kill. Rickey Ray Rector - Took a long time to find a vein. Going through these, most of them were not "botched" as in "failed and had to be redone" but they simply did not go perfectly. Examples or REAL botched executions would be. .. Horace Franklin Dunkins, Jr - The electrodes were not attached properly, and so enough electricity to kill was not possible (only enough to badly hurt). Jimmy Lee Gray - Gas chamber, everything was done wrong, as the executioner, Barry Bruce, was drunk at the time. Nearly all of the lethal injection "botches" were not botches. And as such, the majority of the "43" are nothing but an agenda driven website grasping at straws to try to prove its case. Contention 2: The death penalty takes innocent lives This is a false statement. The judice system takes innocent lives, not the DP. If a DP person is executed, it is not the DP that did them in, but a justice system that pronounced an innocent person as guilty. Even then, much of the "innocent" that have been executed, are deemed "innocent" by groups looking for them to be innocent (this is much like experimental bias in science). And even then, depending on the group that is claiming "innocent," they only have 10 people listed as "possibly innocent" and only 3 that are known and recognized by the US government. And even these are becoming much rarer as we get better forensic technology (use of DNA and such). For the questions for me, these don't really matter. Regardless to what crimes I believe should qualify for the DP and which should not, has no stand on the DP itself. Just like I can be asked exactly what crimes I believe should have a 30 day prision stay, and why should no other crime have that? But my answer is not a factor in whether or not we should have 30 day prision stays. Thank you, [1] . http://www.google.com...= [2] . http://www.google.com...= [3] . http://www.google.com...= [4] . http://deathpenaltycurriculum.org... [5] . http://people.howstuffworks.com... [6] . http://www.wytv.com... [7] . http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org... [8] . http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...