or is the criminal justice system ever so slightly ascew.

I can never decide what position to take on capital puninhment. There seems to be no question that some folks deserve to be executed. Gacy, Bundy, the guy that invented reality television and many other lesser lights have used up all the good will that any society can muster. When you take lives for no disernable reason other than it seemed like a good idea at the time then, we the people decide that planet earth would be better off if you left the building...for good.

Exhibit A. In Virginia tonight one Michael Lenz will be executed for stabbing a fellow inmate at Augusta State Prison 68 times. Mr Lenz is a believer in Asatru or Odinism; a pagen religion that worships rocks or '55 Chevys or something. One can only hope that prison officials do not allow him to die with a sword in his hand. Perhaps a pen. It is mightier you know.

The problem isn't the theory but the practice. Places like Texas, which gets a volume discount from the drug store on the lethal injection chemicals, make it easy to oppose capital punishment. There can't be that many people in Texas as opposed to, say, New York that "need killin". Texans actually appears proud of a justice system that puts hundreds of people to death. (N.B. It's no accident that George Bush is from Texas but that's a blog for another day). A little too giddy for my taste.
Illinois stopped all of its executions when it became clear that no one on death row deserved to be there. When a conviction is overturned due to the research performed in conjuction with a high school civics project it's time to put "Old Sparky" in mothballs for a while.
If we are going to kill people legally, let's at least try to kill the right people.

All of this soul-searching arises from the news today that Andrea Yates has been found not guilty by reason of insanity.

For all you lawyers out there, can you please explain to the rest of us why a murderer is "not guilty" by reason of insanity as opposed to "guilty", etc. Correct me if I'm wrong but you did commit the crime and it's no less a crime because you're crazy.

But I digress.

For those of you that have been on the space shuttle, in June of 2001 Andrea Yates waited until her husband left the house one morning and drowned her five children, ages 7 to 6 months in the bathtub. In 2002 she was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. This bit of compassion was all the more remarkable in that the trial was in Houston. Naturally, she appealed.
Wonder of wonders the conviction is overturned based on some testamony regarding an episode of Law & Order. You can't make this stuff up!!
Dear Andrea then gets a new trial and, presto, not guilt by reason of insanity.
I don't wish to appear hard-hearted but really. If there are five dead children and you admit to killing them, you should be guity of something. ...and in Texas?
If this keeps up Texas will have to take the hangman's noose off their license plate or, replace the vulture as the state bird.
Andrea is now off to the state mental hospital. Oh well, at least she should be made to sit in a room and watch nothing but reality television. Now that's cruel and unusual.

...or is George W. Bush the single most clueless person in America?

Today's Washington Post (I'm sure most metro dailies are similar) carried a headline, "Bush to Add Troops in Baghdad, Citing 'Terrible' Sectarian Strife".
The piece goes on to say that the president intends to send more troops to Iraq in an effort to quell sectarian fighting.

Let's forget for a minute that this administration has had three years and three months to "help quell sectarian violence". Let's also forget that practically every general short of Custer and Patton has stated that we don't have, and have never had, enough troops on the ground in Iraq.

The President of the United States, with access to more intelligence than anyone in the world, has apparently cancelled his subscription to every daily publication in America, save The Wall Street Journal (and maybe The Sporting News).

The fighting that has killed 50,000 Iraqi citizens has been getting enough ink in this country to make Paris Hilton jealous. Coma patients know that we are short of troops in Iraq. Even some of the moron 'make-it-up-as-you-go-along-right-wing' screamers on radio talk shows have suggested more men in uniform in the Middle East would be wise. It took a visit from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki (George had to write that one on his cuff) to put George wise to the 411.

Can you imagine the conversation with Cheney and Rumsfeld later in the day? "Dick, Nouri was just here and he tells me that we don't have enough Americans in Iraq to stop the Shiites from killing the Sunnis..or whichever. Is that true?"

"No sir. Unfortunately the Iraqi Prime Minister bought a copy of The New York Times at Dulles and it filled his head with all sorts of crazy ideas. Next he'll be telling us that stem cell research is vital to help cure Alzheimers."

As usual, mainstream media, fearful of being called "liberal", (God forbid), gives old George a pass. (See also Jack Abramoff, Ken Lay, Tom DeLay, etc.) No one to the right of Cindy Sheehan, including the other 2,400 or so mothers of fallen servicemen calls up the Red State Record or whatever the loacl paper happens to be and yells into phone, "My son/daughter might be alive today if George had pulled his head out of his ass a year ago."

For the record: If you must invade countries that haven't attacked us, for God sake at least have some idea what you plan to do once you get there. Purple thumbs make for great color photos in Time magazine, but all the multi-colored digits in the world won't create stability in Iraq until the people in question bring it about themselves. Democracy is a home grown commodity.

Now that George has seen the light with regards troop strength, he can endeavour to ascertain from where those new soldiers will come. Certainly not from the "coalition of the willing". Last time I looked, that mighty band consisted of Great Britian and three or four countries with a GNP about the size of your local McDonald's. Tony Blair is already challenging George Bush for the lowest approval rating since Herbert Hoover. If Blair announces an increase in troop strength from the UK, he'll be calling GW for aslyum.

Let's face it gang - this is America's war and Americans are fighting it. If leaving is not an option, then we had better send a force large enough to do the job.
If George had been something more than a by-stander in Vietnam, he would have heard of General Giap who said, "Never engage the enemy until you have an overwhelming advantage."