June 02, 2003

ANYONE DISAGREE?

Randall Lee’s two brothers and his sister-in-law were killed in the Bali bomb attack. Now he’s been to court to see the accused, including a chanting Samudra:

"I think there's no place in the world for people like him," Lee said.

"I think he should be just taken away, shot in the back of the head and buried in a ditch with just no mark and so basically just wipe him out of existence."

Posted by Tim Blair at June 2, 2003 07:24 PM
Comments

I had a peculiar experience yesterday evening. I was sitting in a pub watching the cricket, and there was someone else on the other side of the pub watching the cricket. He looked very familiar to someone I went to school with, but I knew for a fact it wasn't him, because the friend I went to school with was killed in Bali last year. My point is that if you give me a gun, I'll be very happy to shoot Mr Sumandra in the back of the head for you.

Posted by: MIchael Jennings at June 2, 2003 at 09:19 PM

I agree. Give terrorists the death penalty. When you've got a small cancerous growth on your body, a doctor would cut it off, to stop it spreading and causing more damage. Terrorists are like cancer. Wipe them out...all of them.

I know many of the bourgeois (e.g. Michael Leunig, Bob Ellis) might argue that if we start executing terrorists, then we will be no better than the terrorists themselves. (A typical morally corrupt assertion).

The correct response, of course, is to compare the REASON/S why terrorists kill us and why we would execute them.

Terrorists' reasons for killing -- to hurt/kill the kinds of people who believe in multicultural, democratic, free countries, as well as racial and sexual equality. (Imperfect though all of these countries may be).

Our reasons for executing terrorists -- to prevent ANY CHANCE of a terrorist escaping jail and killing or attempting to kill anyone that these bastards consider to be "infidels" or "the enemy"...husbands, wives, children, whites, asians, blacks, arabs, indians, etc...

I know whose side I am on :-)

Posted by: Richard at June 2, 2003 at 09:30 PM

But would it be morally justifiable to execute terrorists without doing anything to Bob Ellis first?

Posted by: Norman at June 2, 2003 at 11:20 PM

I reckon we should donate Bob Ellis an unlimited bar-tab so the stupid git could drink himself to death.

Posted by: AndyM at June 2, 2003 at 11:38 PM

Is it too late to second the AndyM's proposal - why I'm even willing to subscribe MONEY for such a noble venture!

Posted by: Lawrie at June 3, 2003 at 12:31 AM

Is it just me, or do other people out there think that the TRUE loony Lefties like Bob Ellis and Michael Leunig are...well...cheap targets. I mean, you know, they just make it too easy.

For example, about 6 weeks ago Ellis wrote a column in the Courier Mail (Brisbane) entitlied "Oppression Has Its Priviledges". It was basically about how this new found freedom in Iraq is SO MUCH WORSE than Saddam's regime. He was waffling on about how Saddam kept the trains running on time, the police on the streets, etc....and how Saddam "oppressed so few of his countrymen".

Yup, believe it or not, he really did say that. Virtually the same as saying how Hitler was so great for Germany because the economy was booming, the people were so patriotic, and as long as you weren't a Jew, you were fine.

As for Leunig...well, if he ain't on some serious drugs, then there's no excuse. :-P

Posted by: Richard at June 3, 2003 at 01:28 AM

I have always thought that the best way to combat terrorism is to make the bad guys more fearful of us than anything else. We should take the fight to them, start quietly blowing away the leaders but make it as messy as possible.

I realise that this is a very un-pc proposal but frankly I don't give a fuck. These creatures do not deserve to live so start making their very existence a living misery. That way, if they spend the rest of their lives looking over their shoulders and waiting for the bullet they won't have any time to think up horrors live 9-11 and Bali.

Posted by: Todd at June 3, 2003 at 12:57 PM

you wouldn't be able to stop the ditch becoming a shrine for the martyr. life imprisonment at least holds the possibility that over a long time a criminal like samudra will experience remorse and possibly renounce the things he was fighting for; and that would be more useful when we are talking about religious brainwashing

Posted by: Gianna at June 3, 2003 at 02:29 PM

Tim, why do you publish comments like this when you know such things can never happen?

Posted by: John at June 3, 2003 at 04:10 PM

I like the Gen "blackjack" Pershing approach used in the Philipines just prior to WW1 - Soak the bullets you execute them with in pigs blood and dump the bodies in a hole filled with pigs entrails.

That stuffs their trip to paradise and access to the virgiss there.

If they can justify terrorism by their religion, I see no problem with using their religion to prevent future terrorists as seeing it as being a path to paradise.

Posted by: Kev Metcalfe at June 3, 2003 at 07:11 PM

Yes, Tim. I disagree.

Shooting people in the head, tossing them in ditches and wiping them out of existence is what Stalinists, Nazis and Saddamites did.

I sort of prefer the rule of law myself.
But hey, anything goes these days, right?

Posted by: Adrian Luca at June 5, 2003 at 12:41 AM

I wasn't aware that the rule of law precluded executions.

Posted by: d smith at June 5, 2003 at 03:12 PM

In fact based on the idea that all power of the state is derived from the threat and act of violence, it might be said that a rule of law depends on executions. By all means be consistent and fair in applying whatever standard of justice you are going to met out, but I doubt the world will be a worse place for no longer having these clowns living in it.

Posted by: LGD at June 5, 2003 at 09:15 PM

Oh, yes, I suppose the law in some countries, such as China, the United States and Indonesia, does allow for executions.

Goodness knows how many innocent people have died as a result.

Oh, well...eggs and omelets, hey?

Posted by: Adrian Luca at June 9, 2003 at 12:35 AM