As IF Times

link Taliban Dream Team: Who are the 5 prisoners traded for Bergdahls freedom? | Fox News.

The release of 5 Taliban guys in exchange for Sgt. Bergdahl  is an event  that has to anger or annoy at least one person.  That would be the number 6 terrorist on the release list.  The link describes the various nefarious exploits of the top 5 Taliban guys and we must suppose that the number 6 guy didn’t quite cause as much mayhem and destruction as the top 5 did.  As we’ve determined before, that consternation must come with mixed feelings.  On the one hand, all the guys below 5 get to still live in relative comfort without the corporate pressure of plotting the next successful hit.  On the other hand, they miss out on the adulation of their peeps back at home.

History is replete with the exploits of those that went above and beyond and were able to distinguish themselves from the vast majority of people who toil anonymously in their chosen fields.  Even in the mass murder and mayhem business, it seems that excellence in the field is rewarded.  You would think by now that some of the foot-soldiers in the Jihad movement would be a little less eager to don the ball bearing vest when they see that their superiors get fed and coddled by the enemy and then feted by their own people upon their release.  All that the plebes get are promises of untouched women in the great beyond.

What’s the lesson here?  It’s the universal one: whatever you do, strive to be the best at it if you want to be treated well by society.  We can foresee the Taliban guys giving inspirational speeches at high school graduations. The incumbent president seems to be taking that philosophy as his operating beacon as well.  Not content to be just a number in the string of Presidents through history, he appears intent on cementing his position as the worst thereby ensuring his immortality.  At this point, Jimmy Carter is rightfully miffed and Woodrow Wilson is convulsing in his grave.

The only certainty about attaining recognition for being the best at what you do is that someone will always come along trying to top that position.  In the case of the 5 Taliban guys just recently released, you can bet that some in the ranks will want to surpass their positions like golfers trying to oust Tiger Woods as number 1.  We can expect more killings, more destruction and larger scale mayhem.   In the case of someone one day trying to usurp Obama’s role in history, well that’s a race to the bottom nobody should want to celebrate.

link World shocked by U.S. execution of Troy Davis – CNN.com.

No they’re not, not unless 24 people constitutes the world.   This is the default spin of outlets such as CNN, supposedly the balanced network.   While it is a  mystery to me why Pope Benedict would care about a cop killer, it’s not a mystery as to why the other luminaries are flapping their gums.  Jimmy Carter is hardly the voice of reason on any topic, but they still trumpet his utterances as if he were some sage wise man.   Let’s look at some of the other outraged parties.

Hmm, the French foreign ministry, they of the ‘let’s bomb Libya’ brigade.  The Guardian newspaper, a notorious lefty publication also chimed in with their tsk tsks.  Apparently the severe financial crisis gripping Europe which threatens to topple governments as well as banks is not as pressing as the fate of cop killer Troy Davis according to a spokesman for the EU.  Perhaps it’s true, the Europeans are more sensitive.

Coincidentally, there was another execution at the same time of another killer, who happened to be non black , which for some reason didn’t arouse the collective attention of the world’s bleeding hearts.   I’m sure that guy felt a bit slighted at the lack of support for his plight.  It’s not clear to me why the sovereign laws of the U.S. are any of the business of other countries which are barely hanging on as nation states.

As a matter of fact, when one does some research, we find that the amount of executions carried out in the U.S. falls far behind the stats yielded by some other well known countries.  According to The International Business Times, Iran and Saudi Arabia execute more of their criminals on any given year than does the U.S.   China outnumbers everyone combined although no firm numbers are offered.  The belief is that they number in the thousands.  On the other hand, executions in those nation states can be for ‘crimes’ which we in the west would consider only iffy social behavior at worst.  For instance, sorcery is punishable by death in Saudi Arabia.  Not only that, but if you’re a woman, they’ll flog you for the heinous crime of driving a car.  Teenagers are not immune to execution.  In China, you can be executed for incompetence or corruption.  !!!  Hmm.  But here in the U.S., even with 30 witnesses, people are still squeamish about executing a cop killer.

Domestically, there are headlines proclaiming that Mr. Davis’s execution was a ‘clear wake up call’ to abolish the death penalty.  Perhaps in the minds of those few who feel that no crime can be heinous enough to warrant any punishment other than strong scolding.  The fact is, capital punishment has always been the penalty for a capital crime, especially when the murder of a law officer is involved.  If not for this, there would be open season on police officers nationwide.   Who would risk their lives to protect others when their own lives are not valued and in some way protected?   In this particular case, over 30 eye witnesses testified that Mr. Davis not only shot the officer, but stood over him and shot him again while he lay helpless.  This is not an O.J. Simpson or Casey Anthony case where the evidence is mainly  “he said, she said” stuff.  These were living eye witnesses. They saw the crime being committed and they pointed him out in open court.

So in determining that the conviction may have been tainted and an innocent man executed because of questionable evidence implies that not only are the laws in error, it means that the 30 plus witnesses, many of whom were black, were also idiots and not credible.  If 30 eye witnesses finger a perp and the result is then seen as questionable, then there’s no point in proceeding with the whole charade of judicial justice as we know it.  They may as well put perps on stage and have them voted guilty or not guilty as in American Idol.

Justice should not only be blind.  These days it should also be deaf.