Welcome Copy and Paste, though I'm not sure we need another Norwegian (just kidding Rk ).  It gets pretty heated in here but it remains mostly civil.  I love discussing subjects with people whom I disagree and I look forward to hearing your arguments.

No Tosk, and jerm, the difference between a drunk driver and a soccer mom on the cell phone, or just even swimming and driving period, is that the death penalty is state sanctioned execution. You all are always talking about the excessiveness of the government. Well, should the government also have a chance at executing innocent people? There is a difference there. It is not media BS when you are talking about taking someones life who did not commit the crime.

But my point was how often does that happen and does that frequency mean we shouldn't do something.  There is a point at which I too would be against the death penalty.  If 20% of the executed were innocent, I'd agree that we shouldn't execute, because the margin for error is so great.  If 10% or even 5% of people put to death were innocent, I'd have serious reservations but I do not think that is the case.  That said, it's hard to know how many innocent have been executed. 

Executed But Possibly Innocent

You can take from the above what you will.  Here's another interesting statistic:

Innocence and the Death Penalty

This may not exactly be helpful to my argument, though I'd submit that it only shows that the appeal system works to a large degree.