Most of them would cut your throat in your sleep. It takes more force than that to stop them.
I suspect that even though you deal with the “dredge” of society you actually do not have contact with real hard cases. You probably see the ones like on Dog the Bounty Hunter. Those are “dredge” but not hard cases.
There are hard cases that would shock most cops. The LAPD has certain parts of town that they do not go into, unless in mass force, where it is a badge of honor to kill a cop.
Right now in my town a 13 year old Hispanic male is charged with murder. He will get sent to prison and turned into a model gangbanger most likely by MS13. When he comes out he will do it all again - he will kill someone’s loved one and then be housed by the State for 25 years before execution. He will be a hero of the gang world and worshiped.
Metering out justice to these scum is not barbaric. It is protecting society. It is no different than killing the enemy on the battlefield. These gangbangers want to tear down the society you old so dear.
Gang bangers are terrorists, just like any member of Al-Qaeda.
What I’ve noticed about the justice system, judging from Freeper comments and from the news stories that Freepers have posted and from what I’ve read in news stories and whatnot, is that the current attitude about justice in the States is that it has stopped being a justice system, where the punishment fits the crime, to one where, if you can just punish the person hard enough and vicious enough and often ebough, he will want to stop being bad and want to be good. It has become a test of wills between the perp and the state, where if the state is strong enough, it will win. I think that is part of the reason why you are reading about SWAT teams busting into suburban homes and shooting it up, where the only crime the guy is accused of is being being his child support payments or some other minor crime, that in times past, would have been handled between the perp and the Sheriff over a cup of coffee.
That isn’t the justice system laid out by Scripture. In Scripture, justice, as defined by God, has three parts. 1. Retribution - the punishment was to influence the person to not commit a crime and if he did, he would be punished enough so that it would hurt. 2. Restitution - what the accused took from the victim, would be replaced by the convicted. For example, if he took your tv set, he would be required to either return it or replace it. 3. Rehabilitation - somebody who has fallen out of favour from society could eventually work himself to a position of respectfulness.
That is justice, as defined by the Bible, but I don’t see that as how the US defines justice.
And it is contributing to your downfall as a country.
And just to clarify, lest anybody lay out such an accusation to nullify my point, I am not a bleeding heart Liberal who is trying to reduce punishments to nonexistence.
I would pull the cord or switch myself, for the death penalty is sometimes the only punishment befitting some crimes.