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Right back to Les Miserables:Originally Posted by DONW
Laborer You broke the law
It's there for people to see
Why should you get the same
As honest men like me?
It is a legalistic attitude for you to determine who is deserving and who is not.
Don, I'm glad you have never needed grace. I sure have. I, nor my children, are no more deserving that an ex-con. He has paid his debt.
Thanks for the chuckle.
I agree. Let's quit making them illegal.
I believe that once your do your time, you should be given a second chance. However, I disagree with using the "juvenile" argument to somehow reduce the mental aspect of the crime.
Now I definitely disagree with your promotion of police vigilantiism. If I have to choose between a system with police officers having more power (the executive branch) in the system as opposed to lawyers (judicial branch), I will continue to take my chances with the lawyers. The passion you talk about with police officers is also concerning to me. What passion? Is it the passion to make everything in the world right and just? Well the problem with allowing this passion to go unchecked is the natural tendency for police officers to go on power trips. I mean, come on, haven't you seen "Training Day?" Lawyers are the device used to check this power.
Taking anyone's freedom is a very serious thing. Our founder's understood this and set up the system to give the defendant every benefit of the doubt. Police have their roles in the system just like the DA's, judges, juries, and the defense attorneys. I think our system is not perfect--some people who are guilty escape conviction and some people are wrongly convicted. But it is the only viable system that can protect individuals from the government.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Valjean steal some silver after he was released?
Valjean did, in fact, steal silver after he was not allowed to make an honest living. He did not steal from an employer. He was wrong to steal the silver, but after he was showed grace by the bishop, the person from whom he stole the silver, he made his decision for Christ and turned his life around. In fact, the bishop not only gave Valjean the silver that was stolen, he gave Valjean some candle sticks that Valjean missed.
That is the very reason Southern Miss was right to give this young man a chance to turn his life around. The man has served his time, and we need to help him become an honest and law abiding man by showing him grace.
Yes .... but he repaid that debt from his subsequent fortune, and never stole again.
Dang ... Sooner beat me too it.
As in all things, the novel is better than the movie/musical.
Sooner, I don't think you were ever involved in a violent crime where someone was killed. Taking another person's life unless it is in self defense or in a war should be punishable by many years in prison. I am against capital punishment, that's way too easy for the criminal to get off. He should be punished and suffer like the victim.
That would be correct in the musical. However, in the book, he did steal one more time after he stole the silver. He stole a coin from a little boy out of shear meaness. He realized his sin almost immediately, and tried to find the boy to return the money, but he could not find the boy. It was this second crime, the crime he committed after being shown grace by the Bishop, that let him see that he was a sinner in the eyes of God. The conversion was complete at that point.
Again, you and I agree on what SHOULD have been the punishment. It was a horrible crime, and the penalty did not seem to fit the crime. The problem is the punishment was what it was, and we cannot change that. Since he is out on parole now, he has paid his debt according to the law, and he now needs to be shown grace by us and allowed to become a productive member of society.
In all other cases except for Les Miserables, I would agree with you. I might even agree with you for this one. However, the musical comes very, very close to getting it just as well as the novel. The movie gets an F-.
Re: Southern Miss signed manslaughter felon
Don, I am mostly in agreement with what you say, except that I am in favor of capital punishment. However, it should be carried out in a relatively short time after conviction. This sorry state of affairs that allows a murderer to hang around 15 - 20 years on death row is rediculous! I would think 5 years at most for appeals, then the death sentence should be carried out. Back in the days of quick application of the death penalty, it was a deterrent to crime. With the elongated waiting time for the penalty to be carried out, most of those on death row die before they are ever put to death.
On the other side of the coin, we don't have "punishment" in our prison system any more. What with climate controlled cells, world class libraries, exercise rooms, educational opportunities, warm places to sleep, enouth food, etc., etc., etc., many prisioners are better off in prison that the victims that they violated! This has to be turned arround so that convicted law breakers actually 'pay' for their sins!
JMHO
TD
~~
Read this letter to the editor in today's Newstar:
In response to "Bill offers options for nonviolent felonies,'' I would like to say in 1981 I was convicted of a felony drug charge. I obtained a bachelor's in accounting, but had to leave Louisiana because the board would not allow me to sit for the certified public accountant exam because of my nonviolent felony conviction. I was told to move to Texas, and it was there I obtained my CPA license.
Louisiana needs to rethink its attitude of lock 'em up and throw away the key. I rarely go back to Louisiana because of the government's attitude toward convicted nonviolent felonies.
Bill Cooper Houston
It's hard to imagine that with all of our corrrupt politics this is the case. However, I still say the boy should not be allowed a scholorship for any football team. And yes, he got off way too light for kicking someone in the head until they died. I hope TECH never adopts the SM policy.
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