Prager University just released its newest online offering.  The course is from the Political Science Department, and features Dennis Prager, the founder of the innovative “internet campus” and  popular  radio talk show host, syndicated columnist, author, and public speaker. In the program, Prager makes a comprehensive and forceful argument for the moral basis of the death penalty for murder.

Click here for the class:  Prager University: Capital Punishment

Prager remarks that though he generally understands the positions taken by opponents of various views, he finds the gulf on his thoughts about the justice of capital punishment and those who disagree “unbridgeable”. To make his points, the talk show host cites the infamous Cheshire, Connecticut, home invasion murders during which a mother and her two daughters were slaughtered.

The details of the case are truly horrific:

According to prosecutors, [Steven] Hayes and his partner-in-crime, Joshua Komisarjevsky, stormed into the home of William Petit; his wife Jennifer Hawke-Petit; and his daughters, 17-year-old Hayley and 11-year-old Michaela.

Authorities said Komisarjevsky spotted the mother and two daughters at a grocery store, followed them home and returned later with Hayes.

They beat the girl’s father (who managed to escape after being tied to a pole in the basement) and forced Hawke-Petit to take out money from a bank before raping and choking her to death.

The men then tied the daughters to a bed, placed pillow covers over their heads and poured gasoline on them before setting the house on fire, authorities added. Both girls died from smoke inhalation and one of the daughters was sexually assaulted.

Both Hayes and his accomplice Komisarjevsky were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. Dr. Petit, the sole survivor of the tragedy, has left the practice of medicine to support the foundations established in memory of his butchered family.

Using this crime as an example, Prager explains that opposing execution for murder “cheapens human life because it belittles murder”. Capital punishment, he asserts, offers remaining family members a sense of justice. Though death penalty opponents cite the execution of innocent people as a possibility, Prager offers that it is a straw-man argument appealing to emotions instead of reason, as these activists oppose ALL executions anyway.

Highlighting his point, Prager quotes Petit: “Death is really the only true, just punishment for certain heinous and depraved murders”.