Posts from — September 2011

I can’t say that I was a really big fan of the band Beirut in the past. I liked them, but wasn’t crazy about the music. However, their latest album, The Riptide, did resonate with me, so I’ve listened to it a lot over the last couple of weeks. I can’t put my finger on exactly what I like more about this album, maybe it’s just an effect of taking a fresh look at the music. Regardless, here’s one of the songs from it, “Goshen”:

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYdXi-AseF8)

I really enjoyed reading Maciej Cegłowski’s post Why Arabic is Terrific. It’s a brief run-down of a lot of the interesting grammatical constructions in the language, from an outsider’s perspective. Arabic isn’t on my short list of things to learn, but this caught my eye.

One thing that I hadn’t thought about:

Muslims believe that Arabic as written in the 7th century A.D. is the language of divine revalation. This has served as a tremendously conservative force on written Arabic, with two important consequences.

The first is that texts from over a thousand years ago remain accessible to modern readers. If you’re an English speaker, where even texts from 200 years ago can be rough going, this is quite a treat.

The applause for the death penalty at the recent Republican debate truly took me by surprise. Here’s the clip in case you haven’t seen it:

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meX1EwDXLp4)

First, from a purely political standpoint, it’s quite a contrast to go from a debate railing against the excesses and encroachment of government to literally cheering the greatest possible power a government can have over its citizens: the right to take a citizen’s life.

I debated the death penalty a bit with some friends a couple of months ago. They were both in favor of it, but I won’t really be able to represent their side of the argument here, since I still can’t quite comprehend it, to be honest. The death penalty isn’t cheaper for society than life in prison, nor has it been shown to be any significant deterrent on crime. The only reasoning left, as far as I can tell, is “an eye for an eye”, which strikes me more as a slogan than a philosophical stance.

Death penalty proponents must place a lot of faith in the system, but I think that place is misplaced.

I recently read the 2009 New Yorker article about Cameron Todd Willingham, which describes the trial and execution of a man who, now with increased scrutiny, was likely innocent. It’s a long article, but definitely worth your time. Willingham was executed in Texas under Governor Rick Perry, so expect to hear this name more if he stays in the race.

The article zooms out to the larger issue a bit, too:

Since 1976, more than a hundred and thirty people on death row have been exonerated. DNA testing, which was developed in the eighties, saved seventeen of them, but the technique can be used only in rare instances.

The amount of effort (and luck) needed to get exonerated is exceptional. It’s not hard to imagine how many people must have not been so lucky.

The discussion with friends that I mentioned above was, as far as I recall, the first time I’ve debated the issue with someone on the other side, but from the polling data I’ve found, I’m clearly in the minority on this one. This page shows the polling numbers broken down by a bunch of different demographics (including religion), and this is the only chart that shows a group that doesn’t support the death penalty:

That page suggests that this difference may be because “Blacks represent 42% of the inmates on death row, but only 12% of the nation’s population.”, but I think it’s a lot simpler than that: a lot of black people have seen a justice system that is anything but just. It would make no sense to trust it with the death penalty.

On a lighter note, this sketch about firing squads is really funny: