His object all sublime
He will achieve in time —
To let the punishment fit the crime —
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment!
Of innocent merriment!

— from The Mikado by Gilbert and Sullivan

A Good Week For The Death Penalty

This week the Commonwealth of Virginia put the DC Sniper, John Allen Muhammed, to death by lethal injection. His accomplice and fellow trigger guy, Lee Boyd Malvo,  gets to live out his days in prison.  He was too young to get the needle. Not quite 18. But for a few months, he would have been killed, too.

In Ohio, the State is playing around with the idea of switching from the the three drug “cocktail” to a single drug protocol that can be used by stabbing the needle into a muscle if a good vein can’t be found.  It seems like the Ohio executioners couldn’t find a good vein after 18 attempts on Romell Broom and the Governor had to call off the execution.

It seems that both Ohio and Texas are trying their damnedest to catch up to Texas as the States who kill the most criminals.  It’s an uphill battle.  Texas kills a lot of criminals. And pretty damn fast, too.

The Death Penalty Doesn’t Work and Doesn’t Even Feel Good

I’ve heard of two reasons why the death penalty exists at all:

1. Retribution – this is the “eye for an eye” argument
2. Deterrence – if murderers know they will die it will make them less prone to murder

Sure, it feels good to call for the head of high profile killers.  Most certainly, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, will be facing the death penalty. The 9/11 terrorists that are about to go on trial in New York are facing the death penalty.  For these folks we, as a society, want justice to be swift and severe.  Well, we’ll get severe. Swift is another story.  The court martial of Maj. Hasan and the trials of the 9/11 terrorists will go on forever providing vicarious thrills for thousands of cable TV viewers and fodder for the “fair and balanced” network screamers.

In the end, though, it’s always a little bit anti-climatic.  Once the criminal has been put down we quickly forget what it was all about and move on to the next high profile atrocity. More to the point, it doesn’t “undo” the crime.  Killing the killer doesn’t bring the dead back to life.  It rarely heals the broken lives of those the murders affected.

Deterrence is a joke.  You can watch the news any night of the week to listen about drive-by shootings, gang-related murders, drug deals gone wrong or wronged boyfriends going nuts and killing their lovers and, sometimes, the whole family. The death penalty does not deter nut cases, whack jobs or people who just plain crack up in the moment and happen to have a gun handy.  It doesn’t deter teens and young adults starving for attention, love and validation from doing what it takes to get attention either from the gang or from the media.

In short, the death penalty doesn’t work and it should be abolished.  I won’t be holding my breath.

On The Other Hand…

… it’s perfectly OK to remove any semblance of reproductive choice from women who have no access to affordable health care.  It seems that the “‘Just Say No’ to Everything” party is pulling out the old chestnut — abortion — to kill health care reform.  They couldn’t kill it with all the scare tactics about the ‘Public Option”. God forbid, one dollar of government money be used to assist poor or even moderate income women with access to the full menu of health care options.

Of course, it’s a nice trick to kill health care reform.  Women of means can always find a doctor who can help terminate a pregnancy and pay for it. It’s the poor and lower middle class who will bring children into their world of financial hardship with limited or zero access to good health care even for the child, lack of educational opportunities and general hardship. No matter whether the pregnancy was bought on by rape, incest or just plain sweet talk from an older man promising love and security but leaving as soon as the fun’s over.

Of course, poor women don’t have high-powered lobbyists on Capitol Hill.  Poor women don’t have lots of money to line the campaign coffers of candidates.

Big Pharma wins.  Big insurance companies win. Politicians win. People most in need of access to affordable health care….sorry.

It doesn’t get any better than this – you can actually get Inman Connect Tickets and help a charity at the same time!  I was the lucky winner of Inman Real Estate Connect Registration Passes and with the creative help of some friends (thanks @tcar and @andykaufman) decided to auction them for charity.

I’m sure @jbern had no clue what was going to happen when he started the competition: What’s Your Tweet Worth? ….between Jay Thomson’s raffle and this auction, there are some creative minds at work to help our colleagues as well as great charities.

So here’s what I would love for you to do –

1.  go place a bid

2   spread the word  **tweet it! facebook it! email it! **

3. check on the bid

4.  spread the word again **tweet it! facebook it! email it! **

The highest bidder will win full registration to Inman Connect San Francisco (both Inman Connect and Blogger’s Connect passes) and proceeds will go to Mothers Fighting For Others (that’s a $939 value).  What are you waiting for??? Go Bid!  We will be announcing the winner before the weekend.

**thanks for the tix Inman!!  Let’s see how much money we can raise**

If you have not attended a Real Estate Bar Camp and you are in the industry – I have one word for you:

WHAT!!???

The first one was in San Francisco right before Inman Connect in June of last year and the masterminds behind it were Andy Kaufman and Todd Carpenter (they are both kind of a big deal btw)….together with the help of a few key people like Brad Coy, Mike Price, and others who are welcome to smack me if I didn’t mention them.  They thought …. why not grab the original bar camp concept and apply it to the real estate industry?  If you have not noticed, our industry is talked about quite a bit in the blogosphere because we have immersed ourselves in new media and we are getting results.

Since REBarcamp San Francisco in 2008 these have taken off like wild fire!  From Denver, to Philly, Charlotte, Orange County, Boston, and many more …..Chicago going on right now. (check out a list at the rebarcamp site – each one has their own site)

What is an REBarCamp?

Straight from the ReBarCamp site –

RE Bar Camp is an ad-hoc gathering born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos, and interaction from attendees.

and from the REBarCamp/Orange County (scheduled for June 25th, 2009)

The most interesting thing about a BarCamp is that it is user/attendant created: the program is developed by the attendees at the event, using big whiteboards upon which a schedule is hastily put together, that can be rewritten or overwritten by attendees to optimize the days’ events.  The goal of BarCamp is to reach out to new people who will increase the common intelligence about new technologies, and to create opportunities for cross-fertilization between people and new ideas.

Why so many, so quick?

Obviously, many of us are not lucky enough to be able to travel across the country to attend these one day “unconferences”, so involved locals have taken on the role to organize these in their home towns and throw their own flavor into the events.   I have had the pleasure of attending 3 of them (SF, NY and Philly) and couldn’t wait to get one started in Miami, not only to learn from my peers and network in my backyard, but also to be able to share Miami with the people I’ve learned to love in this business.

How are REBarcamps put together?

It takes one person to raise their hand and make the decision and then grab a group of volunteers and find sponsors.  It is a free event (although there has been discussion about paying to attend).  Sponsors make the event possible by covering expenses incurred.  For REBarCamp Miami for example (scheduled for September 14th, 2009) – it was David Gibbons from Zillow that asked me on Twitter “when are you doing REBarCamp Miami?”…..and the ball started rolling.  So many people are involved in the back end organizing venues, giveaways, websites, logos…..

Make sure you take a look at the BarCamp’s schedule for your area and make it a point to RSVP and attend!  The information offered is priceless and the fact that they are hands on workshops where you can participate and add your grain of salt is what makes REBarCamps so powerful.   I personally find these events to be invaluable and getting super excited about Miami in September **there were rumors of renaming it “MOJITO CAMP” or even better:

but the rumors are not true….this is not about me people! it’s about coming together in a great place to learn from eachother, with or without mojitos! UGH! 🙂