It’s Tuesday, October 13. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Tyler Cowen applauds African immigrants. Ashley Rindsberg on the tony California school that is driving away Jewish families. Jay Solomon on Carlos the Jackal—and his present-day heirs. And more.
But first: Why livestreaming an execution is a very bad idea.
Last week, Pete Hegseth announced that the firing-squad execution of Nidal Hasan, the former Army psychiatrist who carried out the 2009 Fort Hood massacre, would be livestreamed. According to Charles Fain Lehman, there is no question that Hasan deserves to be executed. Walking into a processing center on the Texas base shouting “Allahu Akbar,” he opened fire on soldiers waiting for medical screenings, killing 14 people, including a pregnant woman, and wounding more than 30 others. In explaining why he wanted a public execution, Hegseth said, “People need to understand that there’s serious consequences for these types of things.”
It’s not the only execution forcing Americans to confront how America puts people to death. Last month, Tennessee attempted to execute Christa Pike for the murder of a classmate 30 years earlier, but she survived two doses of pentobarbital and is now back in prison. That case set off a debate over whether the government can carry out executions competently. Hasan’s case raises a different set of questions: What does livestreaming an execution do to the nature of the act itself? And what does watching one online do to the rest of us?
Charles is a firm supporter of the death penalty. Its purpose, he argues, isn’t to deter future criminals or rehabilitate the condemned, but to deliver justice for crimes so heinous that prison alone can’t answer for them. But precisely because he believes in the death penalty, Charles thinks livestreaming Hasan’s execution is a grave mistake. Read his column on why.
—The Editors
MORE FROM THE FREE PRESS
THE NEWS
The Iran war has cost the average U.S. household nearly $2,000 since the conflict began on February 28 this year, according to Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s. Driving the cost are higher energy prices, higher interest rates, and the billions needed to pay for military operations.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard corps were “almost certainly” responsible for a suspected plot to attack an air force base in the UK where U.S. bombers were located, British prime minister Andy Burnham said yesterday. The announcement followed the arrest of several dual British Iranian citizens suspected of planning the attack on the base last month, and the evacuation of a dozen B-1 bombers from the base following intelligence warning of a possible Iranian drone attack.
Russia struck at least six Ukrainian energy infrastructure targets despite Trump’s announcement that the two warring countries had agreed not to bomb each other’s energy systems. “It is increasingly evident that Russia is unwilling to accept an energy ceasefire proposed by the United States and intends to continue its terrorist air attacks against our people and communities,” Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said on X. Ukraine retaliated by launching a series of drone strikes on at least two Russian data centers.
Most Americans oppose betting on U.S. elections, military actions, and other government policy decisions using prediction markets, according to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll released yesterday. Though companies like Kalshi and Polymarket claim to have safeguards to prevent insider trading, some 69 percent of Democrats and 61 percent of Republicans said they opposed use of prediction markets to bet on elections.
Two paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, stolen from a museum in southern France last month, have been recovered, prosecutors said on Monday. The discovery of the works, which were hidden behind a cinder block wall in a home in the town of Clermont-l’Herault, led to the arrest of six people, Marseille prosecutor Nicolas Bessone told reporters.
A GOP ad buyer accidentally spent nearly $25,000 on ads for Maine senator Susan Collins in Portland, Oregon, rather than in Portland in her home state of Maine, NBC reported on Monday. Cross Screen Media, the ad buyer, said in a statement on Monday that the gaffe was “100% our mistake,” and noted that they had refunded the GOP super PAC who paid for the ads.
