Speaker 1: I find the topic of the pardon power of the
Speaker 1: presidency and the way Biden has wielded it sort of
Speaker 1: endlessly fascinating. The bizarre ways in which he's handled it,
Speaker 1: the bizarre justifications for his pardon, his most significant pardon
Speaker 1: obviously being of his son Hunter, the claimed rationale, the
Speaker 1: actual things that he seems to be aiming at. On Monday,
Speaker 1: the President announced that he was commuting the death penalty
Speaker 1: sentence for almost all of the federal death row prisoners.
Speaker 1: Now I've discussed this on the show. I discussed the
Speaker 1: fact that the American Catholic bishops were asking Biden to
Speaker 1: commute the sentences of everyone on death row, and that
Speaker 1: Pope Francis had even reached out Tosident Biden to commute
Speaker 1: the sentences of everyone on death row. The basic Catholic
Speaker 1: position on the death penalty, if I can give a
Speaker 1: fair overall summary, looking at the John Paul to Francis
Speaker 1: sort of perspective as a whole, is basically one of negativity.
Speaker 1: I think it's hard to sustain within Catholic teaching the
Speaker 1: idea that the death penalty is inherently wrong. But the
Speaker 1: John Paul, the second perspective which I don't want to
Speaker 1: denigrate at all. The John Paul perspective, and his perspective,
Speaker 1: let's remember, was coming from communist dominated Poland, where people
Speaker 1: were executed in large numbers for ideological reasons, and so
Speaker 1: from John Paul the second perspective, I don't know that
Speaker 1: he saw too many, you know, just applications of the
Speaker 1: death penalty during his lifetime Poland that was conquered first
Speaker 1: by the Nazis than by the Soviets. But John Paul
Speaker 1: the Second's formulation of Catholic teaching was that the death
Speaker 1: penalty would only be legitimate in very limited circumstances, and
Speaker 1: from JP two's perspective, with the developments in modern systems
Speaker 1: of incarceration, it was largely unnecessary worldwide, and that it
Speaker 1: would be a legitimate thing for Catholics to advocate for
Speaker 1: its abolition. That was the perspective of John Paul the
Speaker 1: Second Benedict the sixteenth. I think Francis has been a
Speaker 1: bit more urgent in his and frankly, this has been
Speaker 1: a difficulty with Francis's papacy is that he has been
Speaker 1: less precise with his moral terminology than JP two was.
Speaker 1: So that's the Catholic perspective. It's the perspective that Joe
Speaker 1: Biden has been met with. I think the anyway, that's
Speaker 1: the perspective, and I'm not going to disagree with it
Speaker 1: or denigrate it. The thing that I was I have
Speaker 1: been critical of Biden throughout his presidency that he had
Speaker 1: for years stated that he was opposed to the death penalty.
Speaker 1: Biden for years was opposed to the death penalty, as
Speaker 1: were many, many, many Democrats, not all, but many. It
Speaker 1: was liberal appointees to the Supreme Court who for a
Speaker 1: time actually ruled that the death penalty was violet of
Speaker 1: the Constitution itself, that the eighth Amendment of the Constitution
Speaker 1: that prohibits cruel and unusual punishment actually prohibits the death penalty. Now,
Speaker 1: that idea was reversed in the nineteen seventies, but it's
Speaker 1: a longstanding thing among liberal criminal justice type that the
Speaker 1: death penalty is inherently wrong and should be abolished. And
Speaker 1: Biden carried that position for years and campaigned on that
Speaker 1: position in twenty twenty that he would abolish the federal
Speaker 1: death penalty. Now, as president, you can't abolish the death
Speaker 1: penalty for state governments, Okay, if you commit murder and
Speaker 1: are prosecuted by a California state prosecutor or a Texas
Speaker 1: state well, let's do this better. If you commit murder
Speaker 1: in Texas and you're prosecuted by a Texas state prosecutor,
Speaker 1: odds are death penalty is very much on the table,
Speaker 1: and Joe Biden has nothing he can do to stop that.
Speaker 1: Joe Biden is a federal official. You've been prosecuted by
Speaker 1: state prosecutors in Texas. However, there are a number of
Speaker 1: people who are prosecuted for capital crimes by federal prosecutors.
Speaker 1: So there are about forty one people who are on
Speaker 1: federal death row. Who secuted by federal prosecutors for crimes
Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily mean that their crimes were worse than other peoples.
Speaker 1: It was just that the offenses they had committed the
Speaker 1: way they had committed them involved some kind of interstate
Speaker 1: conduct or some other violation of federal law such that
Speaker 1: federal prosecutors handled the prosecution rather than state prosecutors. So
Speaker 1: Joe Biden had said when he was running for president
Speaker 1: twenty twenty that he wanted to abolish the death penalty,
Speaker 1: and of course, as president, he is uniquely positioned to
Speaker 1: do something about it because he has the pardon and
Speaker 1: commutation powers. As president, he can pardon every person for
Speaker 1: any kind of federal crime. As part of the pardon power,
Speaker 1: the president can also just commute a sense, a president
Speaker 1: can completely make your criminal conviction go away, or what
Speaker 1: he can do short of obviously, if he can get
Speaker 1: rid of absolutely everything, he can get rid of something, okay.
Speaker 1: So this is sort of a logical extension of the
Speaker 1: sort of logically follows from the pardon power that if
Speaker 1: you're able to completely expunge someone's criminal conviction and criminal punishment,
Speaker 1: then you can expunge a portion of it as well.
Speaker 1: So the president has the power to commute a person's sentence.
Speaker 1: He can say, all right, you've been sentenced to death. Instead,
Speaker 1: I will commute your sentence to life imprisonment without possibility
Speaker 1: of parole. Okay, you've been sentenced to forty years in prison,
Speaker 1: and I can commute your sentence to time served or
Speaker 1: to five years in prison, you know whatever. So the
Speaker 1: president has power. And one of the points I've been
Speaker 1: making about Biden's Catholicism as it relates to the death
Speaker 1: penalty is Biden has campaigned that he was opposed to
Speaker 1: the death penalty. And that's the one thing that Catholic
Speaker 1: liberals sort of like to beat their chests about and
Speaker 1: say that, see, we follow the Church on the death penalty.
Speaker 1: You ignore the Church on the death penalty. You know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we may not necessarily agree with the Church on abortion,
Speaker 1: which you agree with the church, but but we agree
Speaker 1: with the Church on the death penalty. Now, I always
Speaker 1: thought the two things were sort of apples and oranges
Speaker 1: a little bit. One. I think there's a very strong
Speaker 1: argument to be made that these are completely different situations.
Speaker 1: The Catholic Church has acknowledged the the legitimateness of the
Speaker 1: death penalty. It just has to be applied under just circumstances,
Speaker 1: and there is some room for disagreement. Many Catholics argue,
Speaker 1: I think in many cases convincingly that there's legitimate room
Speaker 1: for debate about when the circumstances exist that the death
Speaker 1: penalty could be warranted. And there are some Catholics today
Speaker 1: who say, I think there are some circumstances today even
Speaker 1: where the death penalty is warranted, And it's more an
Speaker 1: argument of how do we correctly apply principles of Catholic
Speaker 1: morality as opposed to abortion, which there's no circumstance under
Speaker 1: which murder is okay, And that's just precisely what abortion is.
Speaker 1: The negative absolute prohibitions of the moral law, as seen
Speaker 1: in the Ten Commandments. Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt
Speaker 1: not steal, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not
Speaker 1: bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet. Those are absolute
Speaker 1: negative prohibitions. It's intrinsically evil to kill an innocent person.
Speaker 1: It may not, in and of itself be evil to
Speaker 1: kill a convicted murderer, particularly if there is some sense
Speaker 1: that there's no other way to keep society safe from
Speaker 1: that person. Okay. So I've always thought that Catholic liberals
Speaker 1: trying to say, well, yeah, we may descend from abortion,
Speaker 1: but you guys descend from the Church on the death penalty,
Speaker 1: so therefore just the same here. No, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: it's a different kind of thing. Catholic liberals dissenting from
Speaker 1: abortion are dissenting from a fundamental, un arguable position of ethics.
Speaker 1: Catholics who disagree about when and where and how the
Speaker 1: death penalty should or shouldn't be applied. I think are
Speaker 1: disagreeing on prudential application of questions of Catholic ethics. I think,
Speaker 1: and I say this as someone who's not really a
Speaker 1: fan of the death but I myself am not really
Speaker 1: a fan of the death penalty, and you can label
Speaker 1: me a softy liberal, but I'm willing to take the
Speaker 1: guidance of JP two and Pope Benedict on this and say, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know that it's really a useful tool of
Speaker 1: criminal justice at this point, especially as it's exercised in America,
Speaker 1: where people have twenty years worth of, you know, appeals
Speaker 1: before they're ever actually executed. I don't know that it's
Speaker 1: actually that effective a deterrent for criminal for the purposes
Speaker 1: of applying criminal law. Now, all that aside as it
Speaker 1: relates to Biden in his Catholicism. The thing I have
Speaker 1: always just been astonished by is that Biden campaigned on
Speaker 1: I'm gonna abolish the death penalty. He gets elected, and
Speaker 1: he proceeds to do nothing to abolish the death penalty. Nothing.
Speaker 1: Even when he had unified Democrat control of the House,
Speaker 1: the Senate, and the White House, he did nothing to
Speaker 1: advance the abolition of the death penalty. Didn't introduce a bill.
Speaker 1: And most critically, what Biden could have done at any
Speaker 1: point over his four years in office is commute the
Speaker 1: sentences of everyone on death row. He just announced a
Speaker 1: moratorium on executions, but he didn't actually commute the sentences
Speaker 1: of anyone on death row. Why because he immediately realized
Speaker 1: it would have been unpopular to do so. And it
Speaker 1: sort of showed to me. Biden's alleged Catholicism pretty much
Speaker 1: ends at the point of a priest poured water on
Speaker 1: his head when he was a baby, and a bishop
Speaker 1: anointed his forehead when he was confirmed, and he goes
Speaker 1: to mass. Outside of those things, and those are not
Speaker 1: insignificant things I believe as a Catholic, I believe in
Speaker 1: the sacraments. But outside of those things, his Catholicism has
Speaker 1: impacted his life in essentially no way, shape or form
Speaker 1: as it relates to his public life. He hasn't even
Speaker 1: let the commitments of Catholicism that, you know, he's the
Speaker 1: idea of the Catholic Church being opposed to the death penalty. Again,
Speaker 1: there's more nuance to it than that, but let's just
Speaker 1: accept it. Let's just take that as face value. Biden's
Speaker 1: Catholicism is so anemic he has allowed it to impact
Speaker 1: his public life so little that even with regards to
Speaker 1: this issue of the death penalty, an issue that he
Speaker 1: as a politician believes is unjust, a practice that he
Speaker 1: believes is unjust, a practice he believes should be abolished,
Speaker 1: a practice that his faith has guided him towards saying
Speaker 1: is unjust and should be abolished. He meets with Pope Francis.
Speaker 1: Pope Francis is urging him to commute the sentences of
Speaker 1: these people, and his own party is largely supportive of this,
Speaker 1: but not people in swing states, not people in Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: not people in Georgia. Not people in Pennsylvania, Georgia. What
Speaker 1: were the swing states? Sorry, I'm losing track of what
Speaker 1: were all the swing states? Pennsylvania and Georgia and North
Speaker 1: Carolina and Michigan in Wisconsin. Biden never commuted the death
Speaker 1: sentences of all the guys on federal death row over
Speaker 1: the course of the four years of his presidency. Why
Speaker 1: because it would have been unpopular. The death penalty is
Speaker 1: still largely supported by people who are independents or moderately supported,
Speaker 1: and Biden didn't want to risk it, so he never
Speaker 1: commuted their death sentences again, in spite of the fact
Speaker 1: that he allegedly believes the death penalty is unjust and
Speaker 1: he's the one human being who could do something about
Speaker 1: it more so than anyone. He could have commuted all
Speaker 1: of the death sentences of all forty one guys on
Speaker 1: death row with a snap of his fingers at any
Speaker 1: pointing over his four years in office, and he didn't
Speaker 1: because of politics. Now, after the election on Monday, December
Speaker 1: twenty third, he does it after the election when there's
Speaker 1: no political ramifications. But he doesn't quite. He only commutes
Speaker 1: the death sentences of thirty seven out of the forty
Speaker 1: prisoners on death row. Only thirty seven out of forty.
Speaker 1: Which ones did he not commute The Boston marathon bomber,
Speaker 1: the Tree of Life synagogue shooter, and the guy who
Speaker 1: murdered nine people at the Emmanuel Ame Church in Charleston,
Speaker 1: South Carolina. So let me understand, you only oppose the
Speaker 1: death penalty unless it's for really, really really bad people. Oh,
Speaker 1: then I guess you don't actually oppose the death penalty.
Speaker 1: Yet again, it's Biden demonstrating he's not gonna let his
Speaker 1: Catholic faith really influence him in a way that makes
Speaker 1: any kind of sense in any way, shape or form.
Speaker 1: We'll dig more into the absolute hypocrisy of pardoning only
Speaker 1: most of the people convicted for capital crimes, commuting the
Speaker 1: sentences of only most of the people convicted of capital crimes,
Speaker 1: not all of them. I mean, how illogical is that.
Speaker 1: We'll discuss this after the break. This is the John
Speaker 1: Girardi Show on The Valley's Power Talk. President Biden on
Speaker 1: Monday announced that he was commuting the death sentences of
Speaker 1: thirty seven of the forty prisoners on federal death Row.
Speaker 1: Why only thirty seven of the forty? He didn't commute
Speaker 1: the sentences of the Boston marathon bomber, the Tree of
Speaker 1: Life synagogue shooter, someone who murdered people at synagogue, and
Speaker 1: the person who murdered nine people at the Emmanuel Ame
Speaker 1: Church in Charleston, South Carolina. What does he say about now,
Speaker 1: I'm going to make the argument I want to talk.
Speaker 1: I'm talking about this from the perspective of Catholicism and
Speaker 1: Biden's Catholicism, which I've argued has basically never, at any
Speaker 1: point in his career, actually done anything to impact his
Speaker 1: beliefs and his ethics and how he exercised public office.
Speaker 1: And I'm astonish that this was like the one thing
Speaker 1: commuting the senses of people on death Row. It's the
Speaker 1: one thing where at least some interpretation of Catholicism. Okay,
Speaker 1: and the Catholic position, as I've noted, on the death
Speaker 1: penalty is a little more nuanced than this. But for
Speaker 1: the most part JP two and John Paul the second
Speaker 1: and Benedict the sixties of said, yeah, like, there might
Speaker 1: be some circumstances where the application of the death penalty
Speaker 1: is legitimate, but we think it's pretty rare, and so
Speaker 1: it's fine for Catholics just to advocate for the abolition
Speaker 1: of the death penalty. And there I think it's legitimate
Speaker 1: to argue there could be some circumstances under which the
Speaker 1: death penalty could be applied Legitimately. There's some disagreement among
Speaker 1: different Catholic thinkers about are there such circumstances today? Pope
Speaker 1: Francis does not think so. But is that a you know,
Speaker 1: some kind of infallible teaching of the pope or is
Speaker 1: that his prudential judgment. I think I think it would
Speaker 1: be more his potential judgment. But but I do say
Speaker 1: this as someone who's really not in favor of the
Speaker 1: death penalty. So I say this is someone not in
Speaker 1: favor of the death penalty. But I find Biden's position
Speaker 1: hopelessly muddled and seems to have absolutely no bearing to
Speaker 1: the teaching of the Catholic Church. Why well, if Biden
Speaker 1: thinks that the death penalty is unjust, how can he
Speaker 1: commute only thirty seven of the forty sentences? Okay, Biden says, today,
Speaker 1: I am commuting the sentences of thirty seven of the
Speaker 1: forty individuals on federal death row to life sentences without
Speaker 1: the possibility of parole. These commutations are consistent with the
Speaker 1: moratorium my administration has imposed on federal executions in cases
Speaker 1: other than terrorism and hate motivated mass murder. So the
Speaker 1: death penalties only unjust except for really, really, really bad guys.
Speaker 1: If that's your position, then you're not really opposed to
Speaker 1: the death penalty. I remember Fanny Willis, the prosecutor for
Speaker 1: Fulton County, Georgia, who's made a name for herself by,
Speaker 1: you know, trying to pay off her boyfriend for the
Speaker 1: prosecution of Donald Trump, and that case has gotten she's
Speaker 1: been completely kicked off that case, which is hilarious. So
Speaker 1: now some other district attorney's office in Georgia has to
Speaker 1: take it up. And I don't think any district attorney's
Speaker 1: office in Georgia is wanting to take up the twenty
Speaker 1: twenty Georgia election case against Trump. Fanny Willis ran for
Speaker 1: DA of Fulton County, Georgia, which encompasses Atlanta, on the
Speaker 1: of I oppose the death penalty. She got elected on that.
Speaker 1: She got elected. You know, this is one of those
Speaker 1: you know, Soros prosecutors. But then they had a case
Speaker 1: where a guy shot up a bunch of Asian massage parlors.
Speaker 1: Some of you might remember that case. The thing was
Speaker 1: about two or three years ago, and she said, I
Speaker 1: was opposed to the death penalty, but now that I've
Speaker 1: seen this, I have to change my position. I have
Speaker 1: to change my position. So now she's pursuing the death
Speaker 1: penalty for that guy, which makes me think, okay, well,
Speaker 1: then you didn't really oppose the death penalty. If you
Speaker 1: only oppose the death penalty except for someone who's really
Speaker 1: really bad, then you don't oppose the death penalty. You
Speaker 1: either opposed it or you don't, And it's entirely foreseeable,
Speaker 1: given that we're talking about capital cases, that the death
Speaker 1: penalty is going to have to be applied or not
Speaker 1: applied to people who do horrendously difficult things like terrorist
Speaker 1: attacks or racially motivated murder. So I asked, So, it
Speaker 1: seems that President Biden has basically decided he's not gonna
Speaker 1: let his Catholicism impact him at all. He waited until
Speaker 1: after the election when there would be no political ramifications.
Speaker 1: But maybe he thought, you know, if I pardon the
Speaker 1: Boston marathon bomber, there could be some residual political ramifications
Speaker 1: for that for Democrats even after I'm gone. So I'm
Speaker 1: not going to pardon him, or the person who shot
Speaker 1: up that synagogue or the person who shot up the
Speaker 1: African American church in South Carolina, because those were racially motivated.
Speaker 1: So that guy's gotta go well, as opposed to all
Speaker 1: the murderers on death row who weren't motivated by hate. Oh,
Speaker 1: hate motivated shootings, those people got to be executed, but
Speaker 1: not the love motivated shooting. Why Why is the motivation
Speaker 1: of racism worse than the motivation of I want to
Speaker 1: kill this cop I want to, you know, I'm sure
Speaker 1: if we go through the other thirty seven people on
Speaker 1: death Row, it's not like they're all lovely people. Are
Speaker 1: they that much worse that I'm You know, someone who
Speaker 1: shoots up a synagogue or shoots up a Black church
Speaker 1: because they don't like Jews or Black people is obviously
Speaker 1: horrible and evil and a monster, and that's a terrible
Speaker 1: thing to do. It's not like the other thirty seven
Speaker 1: guys on death row are nice people. So I think
Speaker 1: it's official. Even in commuting the death sentences of thirty
Speaker 1: seven of the forty people, Biden has basically demonstrated his
Speaker 1: Catholicism has impacted his career in public office basically zero percent.
Speaker 1: So bravo. I mean, I guess you know he can
Speaker 1: applaud himself for doing thirty seven fortieths of what he
Speaker 1: perceives to be the right thing. When we return, I
Speaker 1: want to talk more about the death penalty theoretically and
Speaker 1: see if I can actually discern what Biden believes about it.
Speaker 1: Not sure if I can. Next on The John Gerardi Show,
Speaker 1: with President Biden commuting thirty seven of the forty death
Speaker 1: row inmates on federal death Row, I want to talk
Speaker 1: a little bit about the death penalty itself theoretically, how
Speaker 1: legal thinkers think about it, how Christian legal thinkers think
Speaker 1: about it. Let you step in a little bit to
Speaker 1: my old criminal law classroom. There are four justifications for
Speaker 1: criminal punishment that legal theorists have thought of. Okay, and
Speaker 1: this is we sort of learned about this in law
Speaker 1: school and sort of doing legal theory stuff. Okay, So
Speaker 1: there are four kinds of justifications for criminal punishment. One
Speaker 1: is correction, reform, rehabilitation. Okay, the idea of this person's
Speaker 1: doing bad stuff, let's give him some kind of punishment
Speaker 1: that that's really designed towards rehabilitating this person, reforming this person.
Speaker 1: This reform as a motive for criminal punishment became very popular,
Speaker 1: especially in the twentieth century. Departments of you know, running
Speaker 1: prison systems became known as part departments of corrections. So
Speaker 1: we're going to correct the behavior. And this motivated a
Speaker 1: lot of I think things that in some cases are
Speaker 1: good to have. I think it's good for jails or
Speaker 1: prisons to have, you know, programs for someone, Hey, why
Speaker 1: don't you actually try and do something useful while you're
Speaker 1: in prison? Finish your get your high school diploma, work
Speaker 1: on this thing, get some skills developed, and maybe when
Speaker 1: you get out you can have a better, different path
Speaker 1: in life. And and I think that's a legitimate thing.
Speaker 1: Now a lot of people don't take advantage of that,
Speaker 1: but there are many people who do, and that's a
Speaker 1: good thing. Okay. So correction is one of the motives
Speaker 1: of criminal justice punishments. The other is basically holding, restraining
Speaker 1: this person, holding this person. This person's committing crimes, he's
Speaker 1: a dangerous person. We punish him by putting him in
Speaker 1: jail just to get him away from society, keep him
Speaker 1: from doing more harm. That is ah motive, and I
Speaker 1: think a strong one for criminal justice punishments. We can't
Speaker 1: trust this person out on the streets. We gotta hold
Speaker 1: him in a secure place so he can't harm more people.
Speaker 1: Another motive is deterrence, deterrence for this individual person and
Speaker 1: deterrence for the broader population. California has learned about the
Speaker 1: value of having some kind of deterrent. If people know
Speaker 1: that they're not really going to get punished that badly
Speaker 1: for doing bad things, they're going to keep doing bad things,
Speaker 1: simple as that. So you have to have punishments for
Speaker 1: different kinds of crimes that are at least serious enough
Speaker 1: to be a deterrent. That's that is a valuable, important thing.
Speaker 1: And then there's the idea of vengeance or retribution. Now,
Speaker 1: there are some legal theorists who think that retribution vengeance.
Speaker 1: You did a bad thing, a bad thing needs to
Speaker 1: happen to you. There's some legal theorists who think that
Speaker 1: this is an inherently silly motive or an inherently wrong
Speaker 1: motive for criminal justice punishment. I wouldn't say so. I
Speaker 1: would say that there it is an important moderating factor. Actually.
Speaker 1: For basically, Okay, if you steal four hundred dollars worth
Speaker 1: of merchandise from a store, your sentence shouldn't If you
Speaker 1: shoplift four hundred dollars worth of merchandise, you should be punished,
Speaker 1: but you shouldn't be punished as much as if you
Speaker 1: came into a store with a shotgun and stole two
Speaker 1: thousand dollars worth of merchandise. That person should be punished more.
Speaker 1: He did more wrong things, He did more seriously wrong things.
Speaker 1: If you embezzled five thousand dollars, your sentence shouldn't be
Speaker 1: as serious as the person who embezzled, you know, ten
Speaker 1: million dollars like the bit whise CEOs. Okay, So vengeance
Speaker 1: or retribution as a motive for criminal punishment, it's really
Speaker 1: kind of a thing of proportionality for sentencing purposes. You've
Speaker 1: done something really bad, give you a worse sentence. You've
Speaker 1: done something less bad, we don't give you quite as
Speaker 1: serious a sentence. Now, those are the four different motives
Speaker 1: for criminal punishment, okay, rehabilitation keeping someone away from society,
Speaker 1: detaining someone deterring future bad behavior, deterring bad behavior, and
Speaker 1: then retribution, having the punishment fit the crime. Proportionality and sentence. Now,
Speaker 1: John Paul the Second as pope, he was charged with
Speaker 1: providing ethical guidance for the Catholic Church, and he wrote
Speaker 1: about the death penalty and wrote about the death penalty.
Speaker 1: You know, and by the way, I think sometimes we
Speaker 1: as Americans and American Catholics, looking at how John Paul
Speaker 1: the second was writing and thinking and talking about the
Speaker 1: death penalty, we were looking at it from the relatively
Speaker 1: sane perspective of American criminal law. Where American criminal law
Speaker 1: is largely a pretty just system has been over the
Speaker 1: course of the twentieth century, largely in many cases a
Speaker 1: pretty just system. Most of the people convicted of murder
Speaker 1: in the United States, one the vast majority, did it,
Speaker 1: and two were convicted by some reasonable, fair judicial process. Now,
Speaker 1: the fact that we can't say with certainty that one
Speaker 1: hundred percent of them did it is one of the
Speaker 1: arguments against the death penalty. You know, you make a
Speaker 1: mistake with the death penalty, you can't go back and
Speaker 1: fix it. That's a fair critique, I'd say. But John
Speaker 1: Paul the Second wasn't just writing for the American experience.
Speaker 1: He was Pope of the whole Catholic Church, and pope
Speaker 1: of the whole Catholic Church in the twentyth century, i e.
Speaker 1: The century of communist empires who executed gazillions of people,
Speaker 1: including gazillions of people from his own home country of Poland.
Speaker 1: You know, John Paul's the Seconds writing about the death
Speaker 1: penalty in you know, towards the end of the twentieth century.
Speaker 1: But looking back on one hundred and fifty years of
Speaker 1: liberal governments and in some cases super far right governments
Speaker 1: being just totally bathed in blood of people that they
Speaker 1: executed through some kind of judicial process. So John Paul
Speaker 1: the Second wrote basically, looking at those four principles, of
Speaker 1: those four principles of criminal justice, he focused on detaining
Speaker 1: keeping society safe from someone, and he taught basically, unless
Speaker 1: it's necessary to keep society safe from someone. And here
Speaker 1: he's in the late twentieth century saying, I think prisons
Speaker 1: are a lot better now than they were in you know,
Speaker 1: the twelve hundreds. The death penalties not going to be
Speaker 1: fairly applied or justly applied by principles of Catholic teaching
Speaker 1: unless necessary to keep society safe from someone. And he
Speaker 1: thought that the circumstances of that were fairly vanishingly rare,
Speaker 1: and thus that Catholics could just advocate to abolish the
Speaker 1: death penalty. Joe Biden's principles seemingly are just I'm going
Speaker 1: to pardon commute the death sentences of everyone except for
Speaker 1: these three or four people that it would be really
Speaker 1: politically unpopular for me to commute their sentences. And that's
Speaker 1: why I say, I don't think Biden's Catholicism even impacted
Speaker 1: him here. If he actually thinks the death penalty is wrong,
Speaker 1: that we can keep society safe from these people without
Speaker 1: the death penalty he would have commuted all forty, but no,
Speaker 1: he just he says, I'm only commuting the death sentences
Speaker 1: except for mass terroristic murder or racially motivated murder. Are
Speaker 1: those better kinds of murder? Or or worse kinds of murder? Somehow? Anyway,
Speaker 1: Biden has continued his sort of hypocrisy and lack of Catholicism.
Speaker 1: Even in doing what some what Catholics might think is
Speaker 1: the right thing here, he still can't do it right. Basically,
Speaker 1: I think everything about Biden's Catholicism has been phony. I
Speaker 1: think it has impacted him no more than like a
Speaker 1: social club he tends to attend on Sundays. He has
Speaker 1: refused to let it impact his politics, his conception of
Speaker 1: what justice means. Even in doing this, which Pope Francis
Speaker 1: wanted him to commute these death sentences, even now, he
Speaker 1: can't really le Catholicism totally impact him. When we return
Speaker 1: the Christmas Story on the John Girardi Show, the Christmas
Speaker 1: Story from the first chapter of the Holy Gospel. According
Speaker 1: to Saint John, in the beginning was the Word, and
Speaker 1: the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Speaker 1: He was in the beginning with God, All things were
Speaker 1: made through him, and without him was not anything made.
Speaker 1: That was made. In him was life, and the life
Speaker 1: was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness,
Speaker 1: and the darkness has not overcome it. A reading from
Speaker 1: the second chapter of the Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke.
Speaker 1: Reading from the second chapter of the Holy Gospel according
Speaker 1: to Saint Luke. In those days a decree went out
Speaker 1: from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be enrolled.
Speaker 1: This was the first enrollment when Coirinius was governor of Syria,
Speaker 1: and all went to be enrolled, each to his own city.
Speaker 1: And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the city
Speaker 1: of Nazareth to Judea, to the city of David, which
Speaker 1: is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and
Speaker 1: lineage of David, to be enrolled with Mary, his betrothed,
Speaker 1: who was with child. And while they were there, the
Speaker 1: time came for her to be delivered, and she gave
Speaker 1: birth to her first born son and wrapped him in
Speaker 1: swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there
Speaker 1: was no place for them in the beginning, and in
Speaker 1: that region there were shepherds out in the field keeping
Speaker 1: watch over their flock by night, And an angel of
Speaker 1: the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the
Speaker 1: Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear.
Speaker 1: And the Angel said to them, be not afraid, for behold,
Speaker 1: I bring you good news of a great joy which
Speaker 1: will come to all the people. For to you is
Speaker 1: born this day in the city of David, a savior
Speaker 1: who is Christ's Lord. And this will be a sign
Speaker 1: for you. You will find a babe wrapped in swaddling
Speaker 1: cloths and lying in a manger. And suddenly there was
Speaker 1: with the angel a multitude of the heaven post praising
Speaker 1: God and saying glory to God in the highest and
Speaker 1: on earth peace among men with whom He is clost.
Speaker 1: When the angels went away from them into heaven, the
Speaker 1: shepherd said to one another, let us go over to
Speaker 1: Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the
Speaker 1: Lord had made known to us. And they went with
Speaker 1: haste and found Mary and Joseph in the babe lying
Speaker 1: in a mate. And when they saw it, they made
Speaker 1: known the same which had been told them concerning the child.
Speaker 1: And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds
Speaker 1: told them. But Mary kept all these things, pondering them
Speaker 1: in her heart. Merry Christmas from the John direction. See
Speaker 1: you next time. Non power time