Bitterness ... The Rising

Americans “need your message that all of life is sacred,” President Bush tells Pope Benedict XVI on the South Lawn of the White House.

By 7 to 2, Supreme Court Justices upheld Kentucky’s method of putting criminals to death by lethal injection, clearing the way for other states to resume executions as well.

Amnesty International

Hemlock produces a slow death by gradually paralyzing the central nervous system.... Socrates was found guilty in 399 BCE by a vote of 280 to 220.





















Political/Religious Leaders in Washington, D.C., April 16, 2008, the tail-end of Cherry Blossom Season; and Conium maculatum [or Poison Hemlock]

Photo credits: (c) Doug Mills and the New York Times. 2008. All rights reserved; and Wikipedia Commons. [This image is a work of a United States Department of Agriculture employee, taken or made during the course of the person's official duties]. With thanks.

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Justice John Paul Stevens, a key vote in upholding the death penalty 30 years ago, on Wednesday became the first of the nine sitting justices to say the death penalty violates the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment.