Child killer could get sentenced to death - again

This is precisely what is wrong with the American judicial system. They don't understand the laws of nature. They think they can kill people - twice.

Joseph Duncan, a 46-year-old convicted sex offender sentenced to death for killing 9-year-old Dylan Groene, has been brought up on charges in the death of another boy.

Anthony Martinez, a 10-year-old Californian boy, was kidnapped in April of 1997. His body was found two weeks later, naked, bound and bludgeoned.

According to CNN, "Authorities reportedly discovered the boy's body by following vultures to a remote section of a nearby canyon. The body was partially buried under a pile of rocks and bound with duct tape."

If convicted, Duncan can be sentenced to death - again.

I understand the concept of multiple death sentences. Everyone wants a piece, everyone wants their justice. It just seems that after the first sentence is carried out, the second (or any subsequent death sentences after) is completely useless.

Wouldn't it just be easier to make him work for the rest of his miserable life? Then kill him?

We could tie him up on a string, hang him from a tree, and invite local youth groups and orphanages to come to the jail and beat him like a pinata.

Or we could just stick him in permanent confinement with a group of hardcore rapists.

Whatever it is, I know we could do something a little more creative than giving him a second death sentence.

On a side not to this story, the other thing I found interesting was the fact that Duncan supposedly committed his first sexual offence at the age of 12.

You think that would have been a signal to someone in young Duncan's life that something was horribly amiss. Which now brings to light the interesting question: is Duncan a victim of circumstance and negligence by people who should have been able to help OR is Duncan just a heartless SOB?

ORIGINAL STORY:

Child killer Duncan faces charges in another slaying

(CNN) -- A convicted sex offender who was sentenced to death for killing a 9-year-old Idaho boy is scheduled to be arraigned Monday on charges related to the killing of a 10-year-old California boy.

Joseph Edward Duncan III is expected to appear in court in Riverside County, California, to answer to charges in the 1997 abduction and murder of Anthony Martinez, said a spokesman for the Riverside County District Attorney's office.

Investigators have charged Duncan with murder in Anthony's death.

Law-enforcement officials also are investigating whether Duncan, who committed his first sexual offense at the age of 12, can be tied to other crimes, according to CNN affiliate KTLA in Los Angeles, California.

Martinez was kidnapped on April 4, 1997 from an alley near his home in the city of Beaumont, the station reported; the boy's naked body was discovered a little over two weeks later.

Duncan has confessed to killing Martinez and crushing the boy's head with a rock, KTLA reported, citing court documents.

Authorities reportedly discovered the boy's body by following vultures to a remote section of a nearby canyon. The body was partially buried under a pile of rocks and bound with duct tape, according to KTLA.

Duncan, a high school dropout and drifter, was sentenced to death last August for the torture and murder of Dylan Groene, a 9-year-old Idaho boy.

He was convicted of kidnapping Dylan and his then 8-year-old sister before torturing them at a remote campsite and fatally bludgeoning members of their family.

In 2007, Duncan pleaded guilty to murder and kidnapping counts in state court for the hammer-attack murders of three other Groene family members.

If convicted of murdering Martinez, Duncan can be sentenced to death again.

Start treating Obama like a politician

On Tuesday morning, the world came to a grinding halt as billions of people stopped to watch the inarguably historic inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama as the 44th president of the United States of America. The world witnessed as he became the first black leader of the free world.

At this point, I'm sick of hearing about Obama. Yes - I realize that he is now the president and will make news for the next four years.

But it isn't his politics I'm sick of hearing and seeing - it's his image. I'm sick of Barack Obama the celebrity, and with the recent passing of the inauguration, the Hollywood glamour will hopefully dissipate.

I am happy that he is our president, but this is precisely what I expect - President Barack Obama - not Obama-rama Spectacular Blowout Bash Supreme.

Supporting a candidate is a necessary aspect of political life. Creating a "rock star" persona and marketing him as a god that excrements rainbows and unicorns only sets up his presidency for failure. It sets the standards bar impossibly high.

He will not make money grow on trees.

He will not smash poverty and successfully enact universal healthcare.

He will not save all failing industries in America or return homes lost due to faulty advice from greedy bankers.

And he will certainly not make all of his supporters happy.

If Obama manages to successfully end the Iraq conflict, set our economy on a track to recovery and still have a little time to nurture the areas of education, healthcare and international relations, I think his term will be quite successful.

The problem is that many hardcore Obama-rama supporters act no better than concert groupies - sporting fashion buttons, bumper stickers and gaudy t-shirts in lieu of actual awareness. For some reason, the new fad seems to be being politically "active" via star-worship.

Not all Obama supporters have this attitude, but there are definitely those who only have a copy of Shepard Fairey's portrait of Obama because they think it's cool.

The attitude of Obama's supporters, however, was significantly more bearable than hardcore John McCain supporters who thought it cute to show off Curious George plushies with Obama buttons and yell obscenities about Obama during McCain's concession speech.

But once again, the same rule applies. Not all McCain supporters were like this, but I'm sure that the majority of the ones that were only acted like idiots because it was the "popular" way to show support for McCain. This includes Facebookers with "NObama," monkey-themed profile pictures.

The atmosphere surrounding the election proves that the celebrity cloud wasn't limited to just Obama but engulfed McCain as well. His supporters were just as eager and willing to turn their presidential candidate into an entertaining commodity rather than promoting his political platforms. Both are guilty of parading around shows like Saturday Night Live with about as much dignity as a state fair sideshow.

About the only performer in the 2008 political drama that wasn't backstage-pass worthy was Joe Biden. But then again, look who his competition was - Sarah Palin. How do you compete with someone who would probably do just about anything for green-room access?

Despite the better efforts of starry-eyed fans and media outlets obsessed with image over issues, Obama did reasonably well Tuesday, covering his overall goals in the inauguration speech, although the speech itself was somewhat dismal as he meticulously outlined the stormy skies ahead.

"That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost, jobs shed, businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly, our schools fail too many and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet."

In summary: we're screwed.

So in the wake of these crises, the American people need someone to look to. It should be our president, whose duty it is to lead us through our dark times. My fear is that people expect an entertaining celebrity and will be sorely disappointed with the result.

Barack is a pop idol, but President Obama is not a superstar - only a man with a mission to make our lives better.

And that should be enough for the American people.

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© Copyright 2009 The Sidelines - Posted 01/22/09

Video games do not equal combat

I love video games.

I got my first console when I was in elementary school - a Super Nintendo. In middle school I received a Playstation for Christmas. And finally, after a long wait similar to Cartman and the Wii, I got my Playstation 2 as a junior in high school.

The world of interactive entertainment has definitely evolved from the heydays of killing brain cells in shady arcades. Video games help to develop hand-eye coordination, logic and puzzle-solving skills, and continue to turn entire generations into tech-savvy beings. And despite limited time to play, I still engage in video games as often as possible.

So I was very disturbed to hear a CNN report yesterday about a new military recruitment facility in a Philadelphia shopping mall.

According to the report, the $12 million facility "has 60 personal computers loaded with military video games, 19 Xbox 360 video game controllers and a series of interactive screens describing military bases and career options in great detail."

Jesse Hamilton, a recent veteran of Iraq, spoke out against the new recruitment effort and said, "[The Army Experience Center is] very deceiving and very far from realistic. You can't simulate the loss when you see people getting killed. It's not very likely you are going to get into a firefight. The only way to simulate the heat is holding a blow dryer to your face."

The fact that the military might be trying to make a vague connection between actual warfare and a video game like Call of Duty 4 is utterly insulting to all active and veteran soldiers. It's almost saying their job was and is no harder than pushing a few buttons.

Comparing warfare to simulated combat is like seeing "Schindler's List" and proclaiming you can sympathize with Holocaust survivors.

To clarify, this topic has nothing to do with the military overall. I'm not up for writing much about whether I support or disapprove of the war or my opinion on our outgoing and incoming presidents' foreign policies.

What I do find interesting, however, is the area of military recruitment. I constantly refer to the recruitment mall next to Hobby Lobby off of Old Fort Parkway as "piranha row."

I call it piranha row because recruiters will try to get as many bites at a potential recruit as possible - anything to boost the Army's ever dropping enlistment rate.

To be fair, I am an Army brat via my father, so my dislike of recruitment officers started at a very young age. By the age of 12, I was receiving US Army paraphernalia - bags, visors, Frisbees, sunglasses.

When I was 14, I joined my high school's JROTC program. This was mostly out of respect for my father, who was, at the time, the executive officer of the program.

When I was 15, a sophomore, the Army recruiter came to visit.

I, along with my fellow classmates, were told to come to school in dress uniform and give up our lunch periods to stand with the Army recruiter to talk with our fellow, non-JROTC peers.   We were supposed to sell the army life, despite the fact that we hadn't lived it. I just found it to be useful excuse not to be forced to find a seat in our already over-crowded cafeteria.

I ditched JROTC my sophomore year and refused to sign-up or respond to any postcards, letters or e-mails I had, and do still occasionally, receive.

But after reading another recruitment-themed story on Dec. 22, 2008 at Comcast.net, I'm actually starting to feel like recent recruiters are little more than Uncle Sam's punching bags.   The story talks about the multiple suicides that have plagued the Houston Recruiting Battalion over the past three years. All soldiers served combat tours before becoming recruiters.

One death in particular, Sgt. 1st Class Patrick Henderson, is the main focus since his widow, Staff Sgt. Amanda Henderson, and Texas Sen. John Cornyn (R) have pressed the state senate for an investigation into Patrick's suicide.

According to Amanda, her husband worked "13-hour days, six days a week, often encountering abuse from young people and their parents… When he [Patrick] and other recruiters would gripe about their pressure to meet their quotas, their supervisors would snarl that they ought to be grateful they were not in Iraq."

Barely a year after taking the recruiting position, 35-year-old Patrick hanged himself in his backyard shed with a dog chain.

Wretched isn't strong enough to describe Patrick's last year of life and tragic isn't nearly appropriate enough to describe his death.

Whatever causes these soldiers' distress, the added pressures of creating a magical illusion of play fighting through entertainment and promising real-life, video game glory at the potential cost of young Americans' lives is more than enough to cause any human being distress - especially when that person knows the truth.

At this point, I'm not sure what's worse: asking soldiers to out-right fabricate combat situations to boost enlistment numbers or being the person who has to lie to unsuspecting young men and women?

I just hope we don't start opening martial arts studios asking kids to train with Mortal Kombat and then turn around, expecting them to break cement blocks with their bare foreheads.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 01/15/09

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© Copyright 2009 The Sidelines