BY DAN
KENNEDY
Serving the reality-based community since 2002.
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Thursday, May 12, 2005
NOT FOOLED IN TEXAS. You
might think Governor Mitt Romney's proposal to bring back the death
penalty would go over big in Texas. Well, you would be wrong - at
least in the eyes of Cragg Hines, a Washington-based columnist (and
sixth-generation Texan) for the Houston Chronicle.
Hines
writes:
No matter that
Massachusetts has one of the lowest murder rates in the nation
(about one-third the rate of execution-happy Texas). Or that there
has not been an execution in Massachusetts since 1947 (a
two-electrocution day following a murder in a botched
robbery).
Romney, after years of
death-penalty chatter, hopped firmly aboard the Executioner's
Express. He threw in the old, unfounded deterrent chestnut.
(Romney's ever-faithful lieutenant governor, Kerry Healey, in a
bizarre stab at the bandwagon technique, argued that Massachusetts
should not remain in the minority of states that does not allow
the death penalty.)
Romney tried to dress up his
proposal with some scientific claptrap, including a nod to DNA
testing. Romney called his proposal the "gold standard" for
capital punishment laws and suggested it was all but
foolproof.
The only way in which his move
is the "gold standard" is in political crassness. And, yes, it's a
foolproof way to suck up to hard-right Republicans across the
country.
If Romney intends to pander his way
to the presidency, it looks like he's got some work to do.
posted at 2:31 PM |
4 comments
|
link
4 Comments:
The running for Gov. while running against Mass.[nationally] routine is getting real old.
I'm more ashamed he came here and won, than of the state's record on the punnishment of capital crime.
Hopefully he'll run for Pres. and go back to Utah after he fails to get the nomination.
Can he take all the Article 8 bigots and idiotic Massresistance woman with him?
Oh, I see. The fact that the idea originates in Texas somehow imbues it with more credibility? Following that line of reasoning, Ted Kennedy has never done anything worthwhile because Howie Carr says so. BS demagoguery.
I can see that the quality of debate here is as usual...on par with a 1973 Soviet Lada.
Romney is a great panderer (?), as all of you well know.
MEDIA LOG ARCHIVES
Dan Kennedy is senior writer and media critic for the Boston Phoenix.
