Jaw-Dropper: Ultraliberal Justice Stevens Regrets Shooting Down Admiral Yamamoto's Plane, Analogizing It To A Death-Penalty Execution of a Man Undeserving Of Such a "Punishment"

Via Instapundit.

[Justice Stevens] won a bronze star for his [World War II] service as a cryptographer, after he helped break the code that informed American officials that Adm. Isoroku Yamamoto, the commander of the Japanese Navy and architect of the Pearl Harbor attack, was about to travel to the front. Based on the code-breaking of Stevens and others, U.S. pilots, on Roosevelt’s orders, shot down Yamamoto’s plane in April 1943.

Stevens told me he was troubled by the fact that Yamamoto, a highly intelligent officer who had lived in the United States and become friends with American officers, was shot down with so little apparent deliberation or humanitarian consideration. The experience, he said, raised questions in his mind about the fairness of the death penalty. “I was on the desk, on watch, when I got word that they had shot down Yamamoto in the Solomon Islands, and I remember thinking: This is a particular individual they went out to intercept,” he said. “There is a very different notion when you’re thinking about killing an individual, as opposed to killing a soldier in the line of fire.” Stevens said that, partly as a result of his World War II experience, he has tried on the court to narrow the category of offenders who are eligible for the death penalty and to ensure that it is imposed fairly and accurately. He has been the most outspoken critic of the death penalty on the current court.

Eugene Volokh patiently explains why this is (my word here) fucking insane.

Remember, Justice Stevens will retire next term.

Think about that when making vows about never voting for an insufficiently godly or conservative Republican candidate.

Stevens and Ginsberg are both archliberals, and both nearing the end of their (dubious) terms of service. Hillary would replace them with archliberals. Young archliberals. If she could nominate a fourteen-year-old Goth poseur for the Supreme Court, she would.

Wonder what Stevens thought about our "execution" of al Zarqawi, and how much he regrets not being able to sign a stay of execution for this wonderful man.

posted by Ace at 05:51 PM

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