In joining Jimmy Carter in supporting clemency for death-row inmate Troy Davis, Libertarian Party presidential nominee Bob Barr says that while he believes the Davis case should be given a closer look before Davis is put to death by the state, he (Barr) is “a strong believer in the death penalty as an appropriate and just punishment.”
Bob Barr: ‘Strong believer’ in death penalty as ‘appropriate and just punishment’
September 22nd, 2008 · 18 Comments
Filed Under: Libertarian Party
18 responses so far ↓
1 pdsa // Sep 22, 2008 at 2:30 pm
The only reason Barr cares about Troy Davis is because he’s a primary cause of Davis being railroaded. Yet he cannot publicly admit responsibility? He’s no conservative, he’s a new righty.
2 Steve LaBianca // Sep 22, 2008 at 2:45 pm
Just one more reason as a libertarian, to oppose Barr.
While the death penalty may seem like justice for some, I for one am very opposed to giving the state the power to kill people. This is one of the reasons I oppose war . . . the death sentence imposed upon people.
3 Steve LaBianca // Sep 22, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Even Ron Paul changed his mind on the death penalty . . . 20 years ago, he stated in his PBS interview as the LP nominee that he supported the death penalty. No longer . . . that’s called seeing the light, while Barr will forever be in the dark about libertarianism.
4 Robert Milnes // Sep 22, 2008 at 2:51 pm
I am against the death penalty. I am against Barr.
5 svf // Sep 22, 2008 at 2:56 pm
Even Ron Paul changed his mind on the death penalty
Hell, Bob Barr has changed his mind about a whole lot of things… maybe the death penalty is next. Perhaps the Troy Davis case will push him over the edge. Perhaps Mr. LaBianca and other LPers could send him well-reasoned and persuasive arguments against the death penalty to help him see the light.
I am against the death penalty. I am voting for Barr.
6 Thomas L. Knapp // Sep 22, 2008 at 3:15 pm
With a likely innocent life hanging on the line, I’m less interested in why Bob Barr is on the right side of this case (but perhaps wrong on the bigger picture) than I am in the fact the he is on the right side of the case.
7 pdsa // Sep 22, 2008 at 3:20 pm
svf - Barr is directly responsible for the gutting of Habeas Corpus in the Republican Hijacking of the 1995 Anti-Terroism legislation, which got repackaged and renamed: “Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act in 1996″.
It is the gutting of habeas appeals written into this law that has caused the travesty of justice in the Troy Davis case.
Barr politicised habeaas corpus, as a part the GOP’s Contract On America in the 90’s. He rammed through the legislation which is the cause of exculpatory evidence being denied for procedural grounds in the Troy Davis appeals.
Engineer Bob Barr was driving the train that railroaded Davis. Why won’t he at least admit his mistake, and his henious assault upon habeas corpus?
8 Ross Levin // Sep 22, 2008 at 3:32 pm
Bob Herbert wrote a piece about this case. Didn’t mention Barr, though.
9 pdsa // Sep 22, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Thomas L. Knapp - it is commendable that Barr has come out against the execution of Troy Davis.
Still he should be a REAL conservative about it, apologise to Amerioca for his past transgressions, and accept the blood on his hands if Davis is executed. Until he does, he’s just a contemporary conservative who still has not yet tossed every scrap of his soul into the bottomless pit of moral relativism in my book.
10 johnlowell // Sep 22, 2008 at 4:52 pm
Perhaps Barr’s enthusiastic support for the death penalty will explain why he may have signed a check paying for his former wife’s abortion. There, too, the one paying the penalty was innocent. Say it isn’t so, Bob.
11 G.E. // Sep 22, 2008 at 5:30 pm
WAMMY!
12 Hugh Jass // Sep 22, 2008 at 6:51 pm
As a pro-death penalty libertarian, I don’t see whats wrong with this. However, I still don’t think Barr is a libertarian, for unrelated reasons.
13 pdsa // Sep 22, 2008 at 7:06 pm
Hugh Jass - you have no problem with executing a man for something he didn’t do, even though every person who testified for the defense as witnesses, excepting the man who seems to be the real killer, has recanted his testimony?
You have no problem that this is not considered to be evidence worthy of another trial? If this is true, you may be pro-death penalty, but you are hardly a libertarian.
14 Hugh Jass // Sep 22, 2008 at 7:29 pm
Maybe I read it differently than you did, but it sounded like Barr opposed putting Davis to death, but supported the death penalty in principle. While I object to Barr on dozens of other issues, I don’t see anything wrong with supporting the death penalty.
15 G.E. // Sep 22, 2008 at 7:31 pm
I also think murderers and rapists should be put to death.
But not by the state.
No death penalty while the monopoly government still exists.
16 darolew // Sep 22, 2008 at 11:51 pm
I oppose the death penalty. No government–and certainly no private corporation–should be executing people. If one is found to be falsely accused, normally compensation is possible. Not so in the case of the death penalty. That alone should be enough reason to give pause.
Also, I fail to see how one could justify the death penalty with the non-aggression principle. Sure, killing a murderer (or would-be murderer) while the crime is in progress is self-defense. How is the death penalty self-defense, at all? It’s not self-defense to punch a man in the nose seven years after he kicked me in the shins, and it’s not self-defense to execute a man seven years after he kills someone.
The death penalty is not compensation. It is not libertarian.
The only possible exception is if one agrees to be bound to the death penalty via a contract. And I’m not sure how that would work out.
17 pdsa // Sep 23, 2008 at 1:30 am
Hugh Jass - Again; the reason that Troy Davis is facing execution for a crime he probably did not commit is because of legislation that Barr spearheaded into being in 1996. It is Barr’s own legislated into law habeas limitations that has hog-tied the criminal appellate system; has forced into play procedural time-limited barricades that trump exonerating evidence.
This is what habeas corpus reforms pushed down our throats in the 90’s has done. I am opposed to the death penalty, because the criminal justice system is flawed, and there will always be a chance that a person convicted of a capital crime is not guilty of the act. There are certainly a few crimes for which death is an appropriate punishment.
Omelettes are fine and dandy, as long as you’re the chef or the consumer. They are hell for the suckers whose heads are getting cracked upon the side of the bowl, and poured into the mix. Barr is responsible for this travesty of justice, and it is good he has spoken out against it, but he is a weasel to avoid accepting responsibility for its existence.
18 aviators99 // Oct 5, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Great, now I have nobody for whom to vote. I won’t vote for anyone who is pro death penalty.
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