Public executions, by and of any person for any reason, are Unamerican. You cannot be a patriot and support public executions. I agree that the death penalty for the Fort Hood shooter, a man who shot and killed 13 people, is entirely warranted. He should not see the sun, he should not continue to breathe earthly air. Public execution by firing squad, however, is nuts. The Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and its Evolving Standard of Decency are set up, among other things, to protect our people from barbarism carried out by those in power. It provides a baseline level of dignity to all people, be they innocent or guilty, and guarantees justice be administered fairly as a court concludes. Political extremists have created a pattern of stoking the coals of rage in our society's most vulnerable, and then feeding them televised violence to fan the flames ever higher. Over the past decade, when someome has been killed by government officers, police, or crazed individuals with no governmental ties, the events have been televised for everyone to see. Regardless whether those killings were justifiable (and they usually aren't), the response from a large portion of the general public has shifted. Where once we viewed any such event as an unspeakable tragedy whose causes should be addressed and remedied, we now approach them with a type of perverse voyeurism, viewing them as a hit to the other side, retribution for perceived wrongful acts, "FAFO." We are a sick, ailing nation under a coup by a faction of aging robber barons using disinformation and rage to turn us into animals. There is nothing American about the live firing squad execution of a murderer. There is nothing American about the public assassination of a conservative pundit on a college campus. There is nothing American about a mother of three, posing no threat, being shot in the head. All three of these things were/are being celebrated. The type of barbaric "retribution" that has become increasingly normalized over the past few years is many things. You may call it a win, just desserts, or even cinema. But you can't call it American.