During the ongoing Ukraine crisis, the parties have forgotten basic Diplomacy 101. Instead of compromises, we have all sides lecturing each other instead of working with each other to resolve the crisis. Here is one possible reason why our lectures to Russia on their human rights obligations are falling on deaf ears -- we have the death penalty. While it is still on the books, Russia has not executed a criminal since Putin came to power.
Charles Blow, in today's New York Times column, uses the barbaric execution of Clayton Lockett to note:
Our continued use of the death penalty does not put us in good company. According to a 2014 report from Amnesty International, “only nine countries have continuously executed in each of the past five years — Bangladesh, China, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, U.S.A. and Yemen.”
Notably absent from the list? Russia, which
last executed a criminal in 1999, before President Putin came to power.
Blow writes:
“Lockett grimaced and tensed his body several times over a three-minute period before the execution was shielded from the press. After being declared unconscious 10 minutes into the process, Lockett spoke at three separate moments. The first two were inaudible, however the third time he spoke, Lockett said the word ‘man.’ ”
Our Constitution has clear prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment. Yet we continue to execute people even after the rest of the world is moving on. Companies are refusing to do business with states over this. Doctors are refusing to participate. Even President Obama is starting to admit:
“The application of the death penalty in this country, we have seen significant problems — racial bias, uneven application of the death penalty, you know, situations in which there were individuals on death row who later on were discovered to have been innocent because of exculpatory evidence. And all these, I think, do raise significant questions about how the death penalty is being applied. And this situation in Oklahoma I think just highlights some of the significant problems there.”
Nobody is defending Putin's actions in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine, his criminalization of same-sex marriages, or his suppression of freedom of the press. But we will not begin to develop the standing needed to lecture Russia and other countries on human rights until we abolish the death penalty altogether. This is not a popularity contest. Normally, it is important for the peoples' voices to be heard. But when it comes to basic Constitutional values, the Constitution is supposed to protect this country against the tyranny of the majority. Our justice system has been, since our country was colonized and founded, too much of a blood sport.
Blow admits that the heinous act that triggered the death penalty was pretty awful. But when we make the decision to take the life of another human being in cold blood, we are placing ourselves below Putin's level. That should tell us something -- in some aspects, Putin has more of a conscience than we do as a country. Given that we are in the company of North Korea, our actions with regard to the death penalty are that of a rogue state, not the leader of the free world.
If we are to check the Russians and their ultranationalistic ideology, driven by Alexander Dugin, then that means that we have to restore the values that are outlined in the Constitution and stand up for human decency in our own country before we go lecturing other countries about their records. And while we're at it, we might stop using regime change as a weapon. We have attempted dozens of coup attempts over the years. Yet we're the ones who are lecturing Russia and trying to assert moral superiority. You can argue with Blum's examples, but not the basic fact. Even the New York Times showed a newfound skepticism about the Official Story (TM) when they interviewed the "self-defense" people in Slavyansk recently and concluded that neither narrative showed the whole picture of the conflict in Ukraine.
If we are to solve the world's problems, it has to be done through cooperation. It can be done -- witness the unanimous Security Council vote recently to deploy 12,000 peacekeepers to the Central African Republic last month, done with little fanfare. Unfortunately, too many people on all sides forget this basic moral value.