I am sick to my stomach and soul that Scotland freed the Lockerbie bomber on
compassionate
grounds, allowing the terminally ill creep to die in his homeland, Libya, and rejecting American pleas for justice in the attack that killed 270 people.Abdel Baset al-Megrahi served
ONLY
eight years of his life sentence. Because he's been diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer, Scottish Judge Secretary MacAskill felt that since
"Mr. al-Megrahi now faces a sentence imposed by a higher power,"
he should be set free to die in his own bed in Libya. The mass murderer was convicted in 2001 of taking part in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 on December 21, 1988 - just before Christmas. The airliner exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, and all 259 people aboard and 11 on the ground died when it crashed.This evil man has been given three months to live, or so the doctors guess. He is being given the luxury of dying in his country, in his town, in his home and with his family. Is that appropriately compassionate? Well, my take is that this is definitely compassionate, but definitely NOT appropriate. It is an appalling, disgusting, sickening decision made by misguided notions of compassion. Compassion for this man is an insult to all the victims. The compassion should be directed to the victims and the ongoing, permanent suffering of their families. This is
misplaced
compassion,
misdirected
compassion, and
inappropriate
compassion. All the families of the victims got the bits and pieces of their loved ones returned to them in a box. The same should happen to al-Meghari. Why is this happening? As one wise man once said, "Follow the money...or the oil." Libya's leader, Moammar Gadhafi collected al-Megrahi on his private jet. Western energy companies (including Britain's BP PLC) have moved into Libya in an attempt to tap the country's vast oil and gas wealth. Gadhafi, as reported by FoxNews.com, has renounced terrorism, dismantled Libya's secret nuclear program, and accepted his government's responsibility for the Lockerbie bombing. He has paid compensation to the victim's families. I don't know why he wants this vile creature back in Libya to die. Perhaps it's because there's more to the story...When al-Megrahi landed in Tripoli, more than 1,000 young Libyans gathered to welcome him, cheering and waving Libyan flags. You should know that large public gatherings are rare in Libya, and tightly controlled by the government (especially on the tarmac where Gadhafi's private jet lands). For a country that is supposed to have turned its back on terrorism, protecting, nurturing and celebrating a terrorist murderer is perplexing. Perhaps it means that the roots of Libya are still firmly planted in extremist mentalities. Or maybe it means that, having bowed to economic and political pressure, Libya wished to flex a bicep at the expense of 270 victims and their innumerable family members and friends.To have put al-Meghari on a plane and then to welcome him as a hero, allowing him to die in peace is, in my opinion, an insult to the values of all civilization which believes that life is precious. He forfeited the preciousness of his life when he thought it righteous to murder, killing men, women and children who didn't mean him or anyone else any harm. Shame on Scotland. Shame on Libya. Shame on Scotland again, for not inflicting a death penalty on an unrepentant mass murderer. We do not show the world that we value life when we impose minor consequences on those who devalue and steal lives.
