While I support a punishment that fits the crime, I find a few facts incredibly disturbing when it comes to the death penalty.  1. There is a racial bias when it comes to sentencing people to death. Juries and judges are more inclined to convict people of color than Caucasians. In many cases, it has been proven after the execution that the person did not even commit the crime. When this is a possibility, I cannot support this punishment.
(I can, however, support :www.innocenceproject.org, a non profit working to help death row inmates prove their innocence.) 2. This punishment is supposed to do two things: punish the person who committed the crime(s) and discourage others from doing the same. We are executing a higher percentage of criminals than EVER before! There are 3 million people in the US Prison system! That is roughly 1 out of 100 Americans! More than ANY other country in the world! 3. Also, it is cheaper for a state to keep a person in prison for life without the possibility of parole than to finance all of the legal proceedings involved in a state execution.  The US Prison System, more than anything, pisses me off the most about being an American. What the fuck are we doing in Iraq and Afghanistan if we cannot fix these dire problems at home?! (One huge down side to recruiting heavily in poorer neighborhoods is the fact that a few people are intent on learning military skills only to utilize them back home once they leave the miitary)