News and Current Events - 2012

[AZ.bbm]

I'm saying in cases of mass murder where there is no doubt about who the perp is, there should be no recourse period. You done it, you're dead. I don't care about reasons, excuses, mitigating circumstances.

How's that old saying go, "The quality of mercy be not strained..."?! 

[kathy]

Sick schmick. What part of he killed 12 people in cold blood do you not get? What part of he planned it for months escapes you? Sick my jolly green toenail. He's evil mean bad and nasty. Off with his head.

You said it; I agree. There are five more victims who are still in critical condition, not to mention the mental harm done to the survivors by the images they saw. 
I have an awful feeling he is going to pull the crazy/insane act.  Sure - that'll keep the lawyer(s) going on for years. 
But why - he is evil, pure evil.   

[AZ.bbm]

There is no doubt that Holmes was the perpetrator, but there is severe doubt as to his sanity. Did you see him in court? He looked like one very sick young man to me.

-I concur!

Indeed, what sane person gets up one morning to begin planning an 'A-K spray-down' of a theater full of people?? Does anyone envision Holmes to be a reasonable person, casually flipping a coin, asking himself, "Should I do it, or shouldn't I?"

-No, IMO, the man is either nuts, or else he is under the influence of someone or something external. -Same effect, either way.


Anyway, at least Timothy McVeigh had a motive-- grudges against the Fed for what they made him do to the surrendering Iraqis during Desert Storm, and the way the DOJ retaliatied against ordinary Americans in TX & ID who attempted to protect their families and exercise their right to religious freedom.

[janjo]

Sick schmick. What part of he killed 12 people in cold blood do you not get? What part of he planned it for months escapes you? Sick my jolly green toenail. He's evil mean bad and nasty. Off with his head.

There is no part of "he killed 12 people in cold blood" that I do not get, and I rather resent the fact that you suggest that I don't get it because we are not in agreement on this.
I get it, I just don't think it is moral to execute a sick man, or actually, anyone, because it brings society down to their level.
If he is a murdering coward, and I authorise his execution by my consent as a citizen, then I am a murdering coward too.

As for planning the murders for months, have you any idea what mental illness and the sort of unreality it can bring, is like?
An 18 year old daughter of some very good friends of ours was affected by severe depression.
She was beautiful, and had the most amazing academic qualifications, but she convinced herself that she was no good for anything.
Her parents got her some help over a period of months, and watched her like a hawk, hardly daring to leave her alone for a moment.
On a fateful day her father had to pop out for a few moments and locked the front door, she climbed out of the window, walked to the station, got a train to London, and threw herself beneath an underground train at Mile End.
Mile End was where they used to change trains on the way to see the grandparents.
She had obviously been planning it for months.
When one is in a deluded state, things seem quite reasonable that would in normal health be anathema.

You may think that weakness deserves death, or that evil deserves death, I just don't agree with you.

[AZ.bbm]

talk about crazy; he killed his kids but not his wife?

He probably found out that the kids weren't his...(?)

[AZ.bbm]

There is no part of "he killed 12 people in cold blood" that I do not get, and I rather resent the fact that you suggest that I don't get it because we are not in agreement on this.
I get it, I just don't think it is moral to execute a sick man, or actually, anyone, because it brings society down to their level.
If he is a murdering coward, and I authorise his execution by my consent as a citizen, then I am a murdering coward too.

As for planning the murders for months, have you any idea what mental illness and the sort of unreality it can bring, is like?
An 18 year old daughter of some very good friends of ours was affected by severe depression.
She was beautiful, and had the most amazing academic qualifications, but she convinced herself that she was no good for anything.
Her parents got her some help over a period of months, and watched her like a hawk, hardly daring to leave her alone for a moment.
On a fateful day her father had to pop out for a few moments and locked the front door, she climbed out of the window, walked to the station, got a train to London, and threw herself beneath an underground train at Mile End.
Mile End was where they used to change trains on the way to see the grandparents.
She had obviously been planning it for months.
When one is in a deluded state, things seem quite reasonable that would in normal health be anathema.

You may think that weakness deserves death, or that evil deserves death, I just don't agree with you.

You're right Jess, and thanks for the story.
AFAIK, there's a qualitative difference between the transitorily mentally ill such as that of Holmes, and the more long-term mental illnesses of, say, a Charles Manson, a Ted Kacinzski, or a George W. Bush, Jr., et.al.

Personally, I think that Donald Trump is one of the latter group, the long-term mentally deranged.

[kathy]

A recent case here has outraged a lot of people.  A father, a doctor, killed his two children by stabbing them 48 times.  He had recently found out that his wife, also a doctor, was having an affair with his best friend.  A jury found him not criminally responsible in 2010. He's been in a mental institution ever since but will soon be elligible to unaccompanied leaves.   

Oh, this is outrageous!  He kills the two children - not the cheating wife.  Those children suffered being stabbed 48 times; what harm had they ever done?  They are children!
So he's not criminally responsible?  I disagree with that jury.  I mean, after the first few stabs he knew he was killing the children.  He knew what he did and he did it to get back at the wife. 

This is terrible.  What a sad thing; what a sad thing.

[janjo]

You're right Jess, and thanks for the story.
AFAIK, there's a qualitative difference between the transitorily mentally ill such as that of Holmes, and the more long-term mental illnesses of, say, a Charles Manson, a Ted Kacinzski, or a George W. Bush, Jr., et.al.

Personally, I think that Donald Trump is one of the latter group, the long-term mentally deranged.

Donald Trump most certainly has megalomania!

[doodler]

My first husband was "sick."  He convinced his doctors he was taking his medication and going to work every day. He tried to murder his mother in her sleep. He set our house on fire. I know first hand about "mental illness." And I sincerely believe it is evil manipulation and nothing more. It's amazing how these poor ill people never seem to have any problem when they are getting their own way. They are an unnecessary drain on our society and the pain and suffering they bring is unending for THEIR victims. But by all means, lets spend whatever is necessary to make them comfortable for their entire natural lives and to hell with the people they hurt.

[morrobay]

The medical bills of his victims are estimated to be in the millions; but if, God forbid, he's attacked and injured in jail, his care will be courtesy of the good people of Colorado.

Well, I guess if he's attacked in jail, it won't result in just an injury....

[Tony_]

 FWIW, CNN reported Holmes was under the care of a psychiatrist, before the shootings, and there are legal problems because of confidentiality.  But the newer question might be, at what point does a shrink have an obligation to go to the law?  Priests and lawyers have similar rights of confidentiality, but, to my knowledge, that erodes when there is a serious threat to others.

[doodler]

And HE was the one to raise the confidentiality issue with his lawyers. How crazy is that? How does anyone know the whole thing wasn't a set-up. He took his time planning the attack, planning his survival, why not planning his complete get-away? Does the term crazy like a fox mean anything in today's world?

[janjo]

My first husband was "sick."  He convinced his doctors he was taking his medication and going to work every day. He tried to murder his mother in her sleep. He set our house on fire. I know first hand about "mental illness." And I sincerely believe it is evil manipulation and nothing more. It's amazing how these poor ill people never seem to have any problem when they are getting their own way. They are an unnecessary drain on our society and the pain and suffering they bring is unending for THEIR victims. But by all means, lets spend whatever is necessary to make them comfortable for their entire natural lives and to hell with the people they hurt.

I feel very sorry to hear that your first husband was so ill, and did such terrible things to you and the family, but even so the idea that all people with a mental illness are a drain on society is appalling and not true.
Apart from the fact that you can't put to death everyone with mental illness, which is one in four of us, society would also lose the enormous contribution that people with mental illness make.
No, that is not rubbish, I mean it, some examples:

Winston Churchill who had depression
Vincent Van Gogh - was probably bipolar
Robert Schumann - was bipolar
Isaac Newton -bipolar
Ludwig Van Beethoven-bipolar
Abraham Lincoln-depression
John Nash -schizophrenia

http://www.mentalhealthministries.net/links_resources/other_resources/famouspeople.pdf

If one decided that all people with mental illness were "mad dogs" who deserved to die, and put them to death, we would still be living in mud huts, because we would lose so many creative thinkers.
Of course that is not to understate the amount of suffering that such disorders cause to those affected by them.

[janjo]

On a more cheerful note, I nearly spat out my muesli  with laughing this morning when the BBC Today Programme on BBC Radio 4 were discussing Mitt Romney and the Olympics.

Mark Mardell described his effect on our dear country as "like the Luftwaffe."

We can say what we like about ourselves in our usual self deprecating way, but when Romney an outsider criticised our Olympic preparations, we all pulled together and produced last nights fantastic Olympic opening ceremony.

He then went on to say, "he's off to Israel now, God help them."

[AZ.bbm]

 ^^^
@ "like the Luftwaffe"


Actually, I think 'Israel' is a good place for Willard Romney.

-God help him stay there, Amen?!