Moral Imagination

If you have been following this story, you know that commuting Foster's death sentence was the right thing to do.

Texas Governor Spares Getaway Driver

Death penalty opponents had launched a public-relations campaign to save Foster because they objected to Texas's so-called law of parties, a unique statute in which each participant of a capital crime is held equally responsible. In any other state, the person who actually killed another person might be eligible for execution, but the driver or other participants might not be.

Foster's lawyer, Keith Hampton, estimated that at least a dozen other Texas death row inmates have been executed under the same law, including one this year.

What is especially curious is that the decision by the parole board to commute his execution was approved 6 to 1. You have to ask, "who the hell is that 1, and why is that person on a parole board?"

Personally I favor a movement to make Texas a separate country.

Check out the term 'moral imagination.'

"an ability to imaginatively discern various possibilities for acting in a given situation and to envision the potential help and harm that are likely to result from a given action." Johnson, M., Moral Imagination, Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1993).

I heard the term on Democracy Now. Author Mary Pipher who wrote 'Reviving Ophelia,' used the term while explaining her reasons for returning her Presidential Citation from the American Psychological Association.

At its annual convention just over a week ago, the APA's policymaking council voted overwhelmingly to reject a measure that would have banned its members from participating in interrogations at Guantanamo Bay and other US detention centers. Source

In other words the APA is assisting in torture. Bad bad juju. Hopefully they will have a moment of direct wisdom and ban such behavior. Meanwhile I'm trying to get a refund for all that therapy.