THE WAY OF THE DODO:

Kerry traces his shift on the death penalty (Anne E. Kornblut, 12/18/2002, Boston Globe)

Over the past few years, without much fanfare, Senator John F. Kerry has shifted his stance on one of the most radioactive issues in politics: the death penalty.

Although he still opposes capital punishment for ordinary criminals, Kerry has, since Sept. 11, 2001, repeatedly advocated a caveat for terrorists, arguing that wartime combatants should face execution as enemies of the state. That distinction is a switch for Kerry, who as recently as his 1996 Senate race argued that a death penalty provision for terrorists would serve as a ''terrorist protection policy,'' discouraging anti-death penalty countries from turning suspects over to the United States.

Kerry, in a lengthy interview last week, said his thinking about capital punishment began to evolve before the terrorist attacks, perhaps as early as 1998. But since the suicide jet attacks that killed 3,000 and brought down the World Trade Center, he has been very public about his desire to seek execution for terrorists - a not uncommon conversion in the post-Sept. 11 world, but one that also dovetails nicely with his presidential aspirations, given that no one opposed to capital punishment has won the White House since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964.

After voting three times between 1989 and 1993 to exempt terrorists from the death penalty, Kerry now says he draws a distinction between how the nation should punish domestic criminals and how it should handle foreigners who seek to destroy the United States.

The only observed instances of evolution on Earth are when Southern Democrats evolve towards being pro-choice and Northeastern Democrats evolve towards pro-death penalty, both processes occurring, mysteriously enough, just before they declare their presidential candidacies. Posted by Orrin Judd at December 18, 2002 2:42 PM