Booth's Escape Route

[MaddieM]

(01-22-2013 03:44 PM)wsanto Wrote:  I guess you could make the same argument for Booth. Shooting Lincoln (a defenseless man) in the back of the head at close range was (somehow) to him an heroic act of tyrannacide. Booth was a man loved by his family and friends and he was not an experienced killer in the "cold-blooded" sense.

For me, both Booth and Powell had in them some inherent ability to act in a cold-blooded manner and were able to murder or attempt to murder in a most vicious way. Most people do not have that ability. It's one thing to be a soldier in war defending yourself and your unit; it's another to attack and kill a defenseless person.

We hear it all the time with almost every cold-blooded crime..."I never thought he could do such a thing"..."he seemed like such a nice person"

For both, their signature act has defined them and their character forever. Whatever good qualities they had or seem to have had prior are, in my mind, meaningless.

It's also one thing to be sent into war to die, and quite another to sit safely behind a desk and give the order that those men should die. I guess it's all about perspectives.