Written by Nick Carraway

You can tell a lot about people when you watch what they do when their back is against the wall. When the end is near, people have a habit of either building their legacy or doing all of the awful things they wished they could do when people were watching more closely. Of course, we know which category the president is in.

One of these areas of legacy is the legacy behind federal executions. The Trump administration is rushing to get in some key executions before the end of the term. Usually, we focus on last second pardons, commutations, or reprieves. Who you save says a lot about you. Certainly, that will be a story line that we explore as we get closer to January 20th. Yet, I can’t help but take a look at this story line now.

A large part of the story isn’t necessarily the who, but the how. In the last month, Trump decided that it is high time that we bring back hanging and firing squads. I suppose the guillotine is right around the corner.

I suppose how one dies is a semantic argument. Once the state puts you to death it really doesn’t much matter how they put you to death. Sure, lethal injection might seem more humane than a firing squad, hanging, or gas chamber, but you are just as dead. Just as importantly is the backdrop that this story places against those that support the president.

Still, one cannot overlook the fact that the president is not proceeding as if the death penalty is a necessary evil. He’s removing the necessary from the equation by speeding up the process and adding cruel means into the equation. He’s putting his sadism on display for everyone to see as if that will be his lasting legacy to the world.