Great position, O'Malley. I think you've just coined your 2010 campaign slogan, "The buck STARTS here".

If O'Malley and the General Assembly have to weigh in on this, the result could be a lethal injection user fee.

While I believe the death penalty is certainly immoral, I do not believe that lethal injection can be classified as cruel and unusual punishment.

Plus there's the fact that the severity of punishment is not a deterrent but it is the certainty of punishment. Consider this: how many people exceed the speed limit on the DC Beltway? They all know of the penalties invovled but they know it's pretty unlikely that they will be picked out of a line of cars all doing 70. If everyone was automatically billed $5 for speeding (using automatic GPS trackers linked to a DMV account, theoretically) would the numbers of speeders drop? Of course they would. Some would still do it but the deterrent would be in effect.

By the way, proving that capital punishment is not much of a deterrent proves nothing legally. If we could prove that jail time wasn't a deterrent, it wouldn't serve as an argument to emptying the jails.

Killing someone who is not a threat to others is wrong.

Of course, since the Supreme Court reinstituted the Death Penalty, approximately 1000 people have been executed after having been convicted by our justice system for committing heinous crimes. (Although we are talking about the same justice system that let OJ walk free.) Today in America, 3000 innocent unborn children will be executed for having done nothing wrong whatsoever.

The qualitative and quantitative difference between capital punishment and abortion create a clear priority for any moral person. Mr. O'Malley's priorities speak volumes.

I think BG is confused. The user fees were haircut's thing. Ehrlich was definitely a fee and spend conservative.

Way to go Washington Post.

The above article has been revised this morning to make it appear that O'Malley was seeking "guidance", not passing on the issue as it read yesterday.

Yeah Evan, I heard that BS from the Left throughout the campaign and I'll say again what I've said all along.

Nowhere in O'Malley's agenda will you find a proposal to roll those fees back, will you?

I skimmed through the article. I think that Maryland should appose the death penalty. Good for them! And good for you too, Washington Post!

Now the question remaining is how will O'Malley improve the certainty of punishment in Maryland?

Time to join the rest of the civilized world an ban the death penalty outright.

Great News! Go O' Malley! WE in Houston Harris County,Texas will be watching as we convene our legislature in January!!!

It never ceases to amaze me how citizens can trust a government that routinely makes mistake to always be right proper and correct in doing killing! The bungled job on Angel Diaz, 34 minutes to kill him is just another thing that the gov has known about these chemicals and thier use. Some of them have been banned for use bvy vets!! Not talking military here...Long Live the Memory of Frances Newton, an innocent woman, executed last year in Huntsville, Texas and many other innocents!

BG,

No, you're quite right. We'll need that and then some to pay back all the one time budget raids Haircut made to bring us into a "surplus" without ever fixing the structural funding problems.

Oh, but O'Malley might actually get a slots deal done. Wouldn't that be just too ironic.

Amen Gail. My thoughts are with you. Some crimes are so henious that they warrant the death penalty.

The problem is that long after society has forgotten the victims, the condemned exhaust all legal possibilities and in the process, obtain a college degree and become "born again" while society loses focus on why these people are condemned in the first place.

Technology now is such that DNA evidence proves guilt or innocence beyond the shadow of a doubt. The same could not be said 15 years ago.

The fundamental flaw with the legal system and the death penalty is not race. It's the fact that there is a disparity between wealth and poverty. For a price, you can buy your innocence through legal "dream teams" (ask OJ).

Evan-

Ironic? Not at all. In fact all too predictable.

If O'Malley gets his slots plan, then who was it that couldn't work in a bi-partisan manner for the good of the people for the last four years?

Yeah, BG, Haircut was such a bridge builder that he managed to alienate his closest allies in the slots gambit.

Mike Miller was ready to go but Haircut wanted to give too much of the money to contractor pals and the horse industry instead of back into the budget.

That's the story you're sticking with anyway, right? With Busch rappin' the gavel, it was never going to happen.

Oh and are you referring to the surplus budget? As it turned out, slots weren't needed anyway...but they will be now.

I don't agree with you BG from PG
No crime is henious enough to warrent Death. We kill them for killing others? Where is the moral highground? We cannot blame the accused for the ills of society, just because society forgets about the victim doesn't mean you can place blame on the accused they didn't make the public forget. There are many ills this society has yet to fix, and many of these criminals are just trapped in the system. DNA may provide better evidence, but nothing is 100%. Except capital punishment- that, once executed... can't be reversed.