Explosions at the finish line of the Boston Marathon

[Abagadro]

Or if they pin the blame on his brother. 15 years tops.

You don't know how conspiracy charges work do you?

[HaemishM]

Beck gives Obama till Monday, or else   

That is quite literally the sound of man who should be covered in his own feces while wandering about with dazed eyes on the subway.

[01101010]

Beck gives Obama till Monday, or else   

That is quite literally the sound of man who should be covered in his own feces while wandering about with dazed eyes on the subway.

It is an act for the news entertainment crowd. Fox News Commentary or whatever they call it is the WWE of the news world.

[Paelos]

WWE has more facts.

[Tale]

I would have put that fact in a story.

Someone else who will point to the 'facts' will be Alan Jones, who was proven part right in his ugly stereotyping:

You've removed all context from around the words you've quoted me as saying. Ironic when your post is about reporting stuff.

It is a fact that one of the "find Sunil" people (a college friend of his - tweet now hidden) believed she recognised him, posting "OMG it is Sunil". That's the specific fact I said would have been worthy of a mention, perhaps in a liveblog at the time - that someone who knew him thought she recognised him. This does not make me Alan Jones.

[Stormwaltz]

Americans are fond of saying that our way is more civilized than others'. An eye for an eye is the law of the tribe; vengeance is the law of despots and anarchists. In other countries, he wouldn't have been taken alive, never mind put on trial.

If you think we're better than than them, put your money where your mouth is. Let the boy live.

If my taxes had to go up to keep him alive and safely incarcerated, I would be perfectly serene with that - because every dollar spent is a dollar that proves we are better than the tribes, despots, and anarchists.

Sorry, preachy. I have many friends in Boston and spent the whole week on the edges of chairs. I've seen enough death.

[Paelos]

If he confesses, they will likely let him live. If he goes full whacko and tries to defend his actions with some sort of McVeigh defense, they'll kill him.

[Goumindong]

I would have put that fact in a story.

Someone else who will point to the 'facts' will be Alan Jones, who was proven part right in his ugly stereotyping:

You've removed all context from around the words you've quoted me as saying. Ironic when your post is about reporting stuff.

It is a fact that one of the "find Sunil" people (a college friend of his - tweet now hidden) believed she recognised him, posting "OMG it is Sunil". That's the specific fact I said would have been worthy of a mention, perhaps in a liveblog at the time - that someone who knew him thought she recognised him. This does not make me Alan Jones.

No, its much more likely that she believed the motherfucking lies that redditors parroted about the scanners saying it was Sunil (which of course, just like the idea it was him in the first place, doesn't make any sense) and got repeated so many times by "reputable news organizations" that people thought it was true when it almost certainly was not.

[Ironwood]

Americans are fond of saying that our way is more civilized than others'.

Except every time, it turns out to be a lie.

[Arthur_Parker]

There have been definitive improvements in some areas, Boston used to be a major focal point for raising funds for terrorism.  I don't think it's a question of being "more civilized" or not, maybe just not being so incredibly naive.  Though thinking about it, having the death penalty at all is pretty barbaric.

[Venkman]

Life without parole is generally cheaper than the average death sentence.

Those costs are mostly the courts, not the process of execution itself. Meanwhile, at least in MA, it's $44k a year to keep someone in jail. I'd rather put that into a scholarship for kids affected by this thing.

This isn't just about the costs though, it's about the logic. Keeping a broken person in jail for the rest of their lives does absolutely nothing. Whatever initial pain caused by incarceration dulls over time. How can it not? 20 years? 30? How long does it take for someone to acclimate to whatever situation they're in and won't ever change? I'm sure there's tomes written about this psychology all over the place. I can't imagine anything wakes up in their 40th year in jail saying "man this sucks" with the same heat they did on day 2.

So acclimation into some combination of familiarity and inculturation over that 40 years cost taxpayers $1.7mm. To me, life in prison with no chance of parole just means a boon to whoever owns the prison.

This is world's different from intending to parole someone of course.

[Numtini]

We dont have the death penalty, so that takes care of that. Plus our prison system was last updated when Lincoln was President so dont worry that he's getting some kind of leniency. Walpole is a hellhole.

[Shannow]

Americans are fond of saying that our way is more civilized than others'.

Except every time, it turns out to be a lie.

 

[MahrinSkel]

I can't imagine anything wakes up in their 40th year in jail saying "man this sucks" with the same heat they did on day 2.

I don't suppose anybody wakes up the day after their execution regretting their actions, either.

--Dave

[Ironwood]

Americans are fond of saying that our way is more civilized than others'.

Except every time, it turns out to be a lie.

 

Hey, you wanna convince me that you're Number One, find me something good you're number one at.

I'll wait.

[Paelos]

Hey, you wanna convince me that you're Number One, find me something good you're number one at.

I'll wait.

Fat chicks?

[Ragnoros]

Fat chicks?

"Tell him what he's won, Johnny!"

[Margalis]

Those costs are mostly the courts, not the process of execution itself. Meanwhile, at least in MA, it's $44k a year to keep someone in jail. I'd rather put that into a scholarship for kids affected by this thing.

You can rent and apartment and eat 3 normal meals a day in Boston for less than that!

I get that security and stuff costs money but even so, seems crazy high. Not saying it's wrong, I'm just saying that number is crazy.

[Abagadro]

We dont have the death penalty, so that takes care of that. Plus our prison system was last updated when Lincoln was President so dont worry that he's getting some kind of leniency. Walpole is a hellhole.

I doubt this guy is going to be prosecuted in the state system, so the death penalty is still very much a possibility. He also would end up in one of the federal supermax prisons if convicted.

[Tale]

Seen the plates on the car pics Dzhokhar tweeted last month?

[Venkman]

Shit that's real?

I can't imagine anything wakes up in their 40th year in jail saying "man this sucks" with the same heat they did on day 2.

I don't suppose anybody wakes up the day after their execution regretting their actions, either.

Depends where they end up after they're dead. But that's another thread  

Edit: Interesting thermal imaging shot (after they trained the FLIR on the boat based on the 911 call from the owner). Source. More on TPM.

[Tale]

Shit that's real?

Yes. @J_Tsar is real. There are some "his twitter is fake" warnings around, but they are about @Dzhokhar_ which was wrongly said to be his.

Lots of people are reading the plate as TERRORISTS #1 but it seems it's TeRRORISTa #1. Not sure who it belonged to. They were into cars. Could have been just someone they met one night.

Edit: the car reportedly belongs to one of the three detained acquaintances of the suspects. Might be just a Harlem Shake reference.

[Morat20]

Life without parole is generally cheaper than the average death sentence.

Those costs are mostly the courts, not the process of execution itself. Meanwhile, at least in MA, it's $44k a year to keep someone in jail. I'd rather put that into a scholarship for kids affected by this thing.

Court costs for executions are not going to go down. So it doesn't matter where the costs are accrued in the process-- it still costs more to execute someone that keeping him in jail for life.

[schild]

Neither here nor there, but I'm already tired of hearing about this.

[Paelos]

Neither here nor there, but I'm already tired of hearing about this.

It's going to descend into politics from this point on anyway. We're already edging around the death penalty debate, and the inevitable clusterfuck that comes from that.

[Sir T]

Con control should be coming along fairly soon too.

[Morat20]

Con control should be coming along fairly soon too.

What about a compare/contrast with the hunt for this guy and that LA cop? :)

[K9]

 

[Engels]

Anyone else find this OpEd from the Guardian a bit offensive?

Not trying to stir the pot here, but how does this shit even get past screening?

[KallDrexx]

Anyone else find this OpEd from the Guardian a bit offensive?

Not trying to stir the pot here, but how does this shit even get past screening?

Since this is going into the Politics forum eventually, i don't particularly find it offensive, and agree with most of its points (although not all).  We americans like to be hypocritical over what deaths we want to sympathize with and what deaths we shrug off.

*edit* Also, I haven't seen many articles about actually how much died or the aftermath in general of the Texas explosion (which last I heard from a thread in here, 70 died instead of 3) because the news has spent more time covering the boston bombing.  Hell the front page of USA today has a lot of articles on the Boston bomber getting caught (from all angles!) and I'm not sure where to actually find what's going on in Texas now.

[Engels]

I'm just surprised that someone is so myopic about the difference between daily routine violence and a terrorist attack. Yes, sure the US should have better gun regulation. No question. But terrorists are an unknown quantity, capable of a single shooting spree to knocking down skyscrapers. I don't think it was disproportionate at all to lock down Boston to find these guys because there is no way of knowing the extent of a terrorist plan. It could have been, and probably was, a Columbine type affair of two kids with delirious ideas of anti-US 'heroism' or it could be an activated cell. That's the nature of terrorism, and frankly, I would have expected a Brit, more than just about anyone else, to know this.

[Arthur_Parker]

It's the Guardian, the fact the individual points are valid doesn't mean that overall thrust of article is right.  You shut down a city to get one guy, I think that's a great way to deal with terrorism and something we in the UK never tried.  The Guardian thinks it's an overreaction, fuck em, you completely eradicated one cell and negated the impact from the bombing event faster than most would have thought possible.  

You guys love your guns and I agree with everything they said on getting wise on that, but it's still a different subject entirely.

[Engels]

Thank you AP, I feel a little bit more sane now. I know its the Guardian, but I tend to LIKE the Guardian, by and large. I must admit I haven't read their editorials much.

[K9]

*dons apologist hat* CiF is a bit of a crapshoot at times, and doesn't necessarily reflect the overall editorial direction of the paper. It's intended to throw up a mix of controversy and sober comment. You win some, you lose some.

Personally I feel that this could probably have waited a week or two before being published but otherwise there's nothing substantially wrong with it. It would probably have been written better if it was more general; it's not just Americans who are terrible at assessing the risks associated with black swan events like terrorism, all humans are like that. The sorry state of American gun-control just offers a convenient point to spin a contrast around.

YMMV

[Ironwood]

To be honest, I think the article makes good and reasonable points.  What it doesn't do, however, is have any fucking sense of timing or of NOT using a tragedy as a springboard to make those points.  Poor taste.