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President Obama
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Capital punishment is totally a matter of one’s conviction. There is no science to it. George W. Bush’s convictions were well-known. He adhered to a primitive eye-for-an-eye belief that was resistant to reason. As with almost everything -- including the making of war -- if Bush was comfortable with it, he did it.
With Obama, it’s just the opposite. His convictions regarding capital punishment waver. He supports it, but only when the crimes are, as he said last week, like “mass killings, the killings of children.” Still, his statements are so laden with caveats and conditions that it seems fair to say that Obama, as befits his background and education, would not weep if the United States joined most of the world and abolished capital punishment. We keep interesting company -- North Korea, China, Saudi Arabia and some others. This is not our crowd.
Obama’s position may be evolving, as it did with same-sex marriage. First others -- Vice President Biden, for one -- took the lead and then the president scampered to catch up. At times the president is timorous when polls are not at his back. Most Americans -- but a declining number -- still approve of capital punishment. Obama may choose to lead from behind in this matter, too.
Maybe when Holder writes up his policy review, he will point out that using the nature of the crime as a standard for execution will not work. Every murder is horrible. Every widow grieves; every parent forever hugs the empty air. A statute left on the books for egregious crimes will be used for less egregious ones. The standard has to be absolute: The government will not lower itself to the level of the killer. It will not murder.
And maybe, too, Holder will include a paragraph about presidential leadership -- moral suasion -- and how Obama has seldom exercised any. The president doesn’t need a policy review about capital punishment. He just needs the guts to oppose it.
Source: IndyStar, Richard Cohen, May 6, 2014. Mr. Cohen is a Washington Post columnist.
