Splendid Isolation

It’s a well-known fact that given any job to do, Government will do it a.) badly,  b.) expensively, c.) slowly and d.) with all sorts of unforeseen consequences thereafter.

And so it is with this sorry little tale:

The attorneys for Tennessee death row inmate Christa Pike said Tuesday that Pike is awake and speaking to her medical team after last week’s failed execution attempt, marking a development the attorneys described as “unprecedented.”

The attorneys said Pike is still handcuffed and that her prognosis is still unclear, according to NBC News. The development comes after Pike was on a ventilator last week after she survived two rounds of injections of the lethal drug pentobarbital.

Pike, who was convicted of killing former classmate Colleen Slemmer in 1995 when she was just 18 years old, was initially scheduled to be executed last week, but it was delayed after an appeals court stayed the execution. The Supreme Court later ruled the execution could move forward if it was carried out before midnight.

Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee has halted a third execution attempt in light of the botched injections and has ordered a “comprehensive, third-party review to determine exactly what occurred.” The next attempt will not take place this year.

Anyone who has a brain could have told you that it was only a question of time before Gummint screwed up the only thing it’s supposed to do quickly and efficiently, and instead made a complete dog’s breakfast of a simple act, that of executing a cold-blooded murderer.

Most of this stems from the fact that public opinion has changed from “Hang ’em high!” to “Well, if you must kill them, do it as humanely as possible”, as though executing someone isn’t inhumane enough.

So in the old days, we did it through hanging (for centuries, despite even this being botched on several occasions), through decapitation, first with an axe or sword and when this was also cocked up, with the guillotine — which at least worked properly.

But oooh no, these were all too messy and bloody and stuff (albeit true), so we became more civilized and went on to the gas chamber (and cocked that up), and finally to lethal injections (ending up with the Christa Pike Situation).

What we should have done was follow the example of the military.

Now I know that the military itself has a long and storied history of inefficiency and stupidity [25,278 examples redacted], but the one thing they know something about is killing people — it’s kinda the entire reason for their existence, after all.

So:  firing squads.  Quick, simple, cheap, and very much deadly.  Proof?

Reviewing cases from 1890 through 2010, the Death Penalty Information Center found that lethal injection had the highest rate of botched executions: about 7 percent, compared to 5 percent for lethal gas, 3 percent for hanging, and 2 percent for electrocution. The rate for firing squads was 0 percent.

And just in case people may quail at the brutality of shooting a woman, let us review what this particular woman did that earned her a part in our discussion:

Pike, along with her friend Shadolla Peterson, 18, and boyfriend Shipp, enticed Colleen Slemmer to an abandoned steam mill on the University of Tennessee’s agricultural campus, deep in the woods.

Once out in the secluded spot, Pike made her true intentions known. While Peterson acted as a lookout, she and Shipp subjected their classmate to unthinkable torture using a meat cleaver and a box cutter. More than 100 injuries were inflicted in just 30 minutes.

Colleen’s throat was repeatedly slashed, and she was still alive when a pentagram was carved on her bare chest by Shipp. All the while, she pleaded for her life, as the attackers taunted her.

Tennessee Attorney General’s Office court documents state: “When Slemmer tried to flee, Pike sliced her stomach with the box cutter. … As Slemmer begged for her life, Pike repeatedly kicked her in the face. Pike then cut Slemmer’s throat as she begged for mercy.”

Pike would later tell of how they’d forced Colleen to remove her blouse and bra, to stop her running away, and that she’d tied a rag taken from her around Colleen’s mouth to stop her from speaking. She said: “It was harder to hurt somebody when they’re talking to you.”

Court records also show how Pike had asked a barely-conscious victim, “Colleen, do you know who’s doing this to you?” By this point, she was too severely injured to respond.

Colleen made one last desperate escape attempt, at which point Pike dealt the final fatal blow to the back of her victim’s head with a large piece of asphalt, smashing her skull. The trio then walked away from the scene.

By the time two UT physical plant employees discovered Colleen’s partially clothed body the following morning, the damage was so extensive that they initially believed they were looking at an animal’s corpse.

So now, somebody explain to me why this foul woman should be allowed to live.  Good luck.

As soon as she recovers from the earlier execution attempt — which seems likely(!) — she should be dragged out of hospital, tied to a chair and shot to death by a firing squad.  A military firing squad.  (I’m pretty sure they’ll find no shortage of volunteers [sic]  in the Tennessee National Guard.)

Here’s one example of how this works.  I bet they won’t screw this one up.

End of story.