Yes, he is guilty of murder and I would favour torturing him to death slowly, this is not emotional reactionism, merely a desire for justice and fair punishment.
You do not know for a fact if he is guilty of murder. You only know that he was judged guilty. Whatever the truth is, you and I, and everyone else discussing this, cannot know. McVeigh himself knows if he did it. Witnesses (if any) would also know. This is all speculation.
I thought in my post I qualified that statement with a "If he did it" line, whatever, it doesn`t really matter, the government will always find someone to blame. From now on, in this thread, asssume McVeigh == "McVeigh, if he did it"
Personally, I didn't. I don't call for slow torture because to me, it isn't justice or injustice. I was not affected by his actions. If he did set off the bomb, life in death, or execution is a valid punishment. I do question your reasoning for calling for torture though. How is that fair punishment and justice?
I don`t really judge it in terms of punishment or as justice or as "fair trade". McVeigh took an extreme criminal act of agression against innocent people, I believe that implicit in that act (once proven) is the removal of his rights, that includes the "right not to be tortured" <tm>. I was not directly affected by his actions, and I`m not at all affected by images of death and destruction anyway, I don`t hate McVeigh, I don`t have any personal grudge against him or need to see him punished, I merely recognise that he has surrendered his rights, any punishment is acceptable, whether it is fitting or not is a different thread. The only reason I have any reservations whatsoever about the death penalty in this particular case is because, although I personally believe McVeigh is guilty, there was enough reasonable doubt to get a not-guilty verdict. Datacomms Technologies data security Paul Bradley, Paul@fatmans.demon.co.uk Paul@crypto.uk.eu.org, Paul@cryptography.uk.eu.org Http://www.cryptography.home.ml.org/ Email for PGP public key, ID: FC76DA85 "Don`t forget to mount a scratch monkey"