Death Penalty for Terrorists

Much intelligent discussion of the current security crisis that the United States, and not just the United States, faces has centered on to what extent we and other civilized countries now find ourselves at war -- and if indeed we are at war what constraints precepts of natural justice and sound international jurisprudence impose on the retributive military actions that our government, perhaps aided by its allies, is currently contemplating. This much seems clear and …

…seems there is a powerful argument, even for those of us who think the state justified in administering capital punishment only in those today practically non-existent cases where state self-defense demands it, that this may well be one of these extremely improbable cases. If this is so, the execution of bin Laden and his collaborators would not be an act of vengeful, cowboy retribution but the discharging of a weighty moral obligation by the state.