The Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Evil

There was an episode of Futurama where Bender is mistaken for evil robot Santa and is being put to death for crimes against humanity. The mayor of New New York City tells Bender that he will be put to death in the most humane way possible, by being ripped apart by two magnets. Bender responds, "But Mr. Mayor that doesn't sound very humane!" to which the Mayor responds, "It is for the witnesses because it's not boring!"

This is basically what the supreme court ruled on the Kentucky case challenging the current method of legal injection as cruel and unusual punishment. The current method of lethal injection used is a three-drug cocktail using a barbiturate, paralytic, and finally potassium chloride, which stops the heart. If the method works, the person should experience no pain and die peacefully. However, some in the medical field have testified that occasionally the barbiturate will not work causing the prisoner to experience severe pain but unable to react due to the paralytic. A simple solution would be do give the prisoner an overdose of the barbiturate as we do when we put dogs and cats to sleep. Unfortunately, this method may result in flinching of the prisoner's limbs, which could be upsetting to the audience. Sorry death row inmate but that method of lethal injection is simply not humane enough for the audience watching your performance.

From what I recall from an epic NYTimes Magazine article, the three-drug cocktail wasn't formulated by a scientist or medical doctor but just by some dude. Furthermore, since it is against the physicians code of ethics, no medical doctors take part in administering the lethal ejection. So in summary, the three-drug cocktail was invented by some dude which is then administered by another dude. I would say we could ask how other Western countries administer their death penalties except that NO ONE ELSE DOES. We can ask our friends in Afghanistan who stone to death or behead their adulterers. Or the Iraqis who practice good old-fashioned hangings. I don't think hangings will ever be accepted because failure in that method results in either slow suffocation or beheading, not to mention loss of bowels. But at least it wouldn't be boring.