re cruel was re political atheists in article qnpe inn b gap caltech edu keith cco caltech edu keith allan schneider writes livesey solntze wpd sgi com jon livesey writes they spent quite a bit of time on the wording of the constitution i realise that this is widely held belief in america but in fact the clause on cruel and unusual punishments like a lot of the rest was lifted from the english bill of rights of just because the wording is elsewhere does not mean they didn t spend much time on the wording in the part of the posting you have so helpfully deleted i pointed out that they used the wording from the english bill of rights apparently changing what they understood by it and i asked why then should we two hundred years later be bound by what keith allan schneider thinks they understood by it we have already looked in the dictionary to define the word isn t this sufficient since the dictionary said that a lack of mercy or an intent to inflict injury or grief counted as cruel sure people can be described as cruel in this way but punishments cannot so one cannot say a cruel fate your prevarications are getting increasingly unconvincing i think jon
