WildThingNative-
No, I don't have kids; I'm in college. I NEVER advocated that they should get off clean, but I do propone that such punishment, if to be used at all, must be reserved for heinous murders. I don't say this often, but I'm entirely right on this based on the recent Supreme Court decision regarding outlawing capital punishment for pedophiles, people who usually do worse things to children than what these men did. [The Supreme Court's decision, by the way, is something I very much support because it puts more pedophiles to jail because children abused by their parents will be more likely to testify when they know their testimony won't cause the DEATH of their parent.]
Of course, if I were in the father's situation my emotions would probably get the best of me. But as Drew Westen, a psychologist at Emory University posits, letting our emotions rule threatens our veru survival because we lose our logic that has been one vital to our nation's survival. [Of course, he doesn't say it so sensationally, but that's basically what he says.] And there ARE repercussions; just not death. And even if you were right wing, you'd also be a supporter of lower taxes, which conflicts with capital punishment because CP costs more than providing life sentences. [http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?did=108].
Represent our state? I think I represent our state well and enhance it. Given that most high school students graduating in MN elect to stay in MN for college, I think I represent my state well by choosing to leave this highly isolated, homogeneous, and exclusive state in an attempt to mitigate such deleterious intrinsic characteristics. In many ways, MN is like New York. Though this comparison uses some generalizations, we, as Minnesotans, ostensibly believe that nothing valuable exists outside our state (or certainly the Midwest) and consequently don't bother to verify our beliefs. Though NY is highly diverse and could almost be considered a city-state, MN is highly homogeneous, so while New Yorkers can get away with their ignorance (at least somewhat), Minnesotans can't.
Sorry for the long post.
By the way, my second little aside I thought was relevant given the great sensationalist media. Had the cable intravenous drip not hopped on the New Yorker cover page making fun at all the ridiculous stereotypes about Obama, only the readers of the New Yorker would have gotten it, and the rest of America, those most prone to believe such stereotypes, wouldn't have heard a thing.