Without Question

After a very expensive and prolonged "retrospective" competency hearing (one of the marshals told me that they estimated the court at around two-million dollars), the attorneys for both sides, government and defense, gave their closing arguments today. The government argues, in the interest of seeing me killed in the name of justice (truth be damned), that the defendant (me) has consistantly demonstrated his competence, and was in fact fully competent when he (the "defendant") waived his appeal of three death sentences, and has never demonstrated the overt incompetence that the defense lawyers assert. The "defense" argues, in the interest of saving my life (truth be damned), that Mr. Duncan (me) has a severe psychotic brain impairment that causes him to make all his decisions (legal and otherwise) in the erroneous context of a complex delusional belief system that is completely removed from reality. Hence, the decision to waive his appeals was made non-volitionally and incompetently. I would argue if given the chance, in the interest of the Truth (my life, or death, be damned), that the question of my so-called "competence" or even "sanity" should not be a part of the process of determining what society should do in response to my clearly criminal (i.e. socially destructive) behavior. The only question should be, "What happened?" If we ask ourselves that question honestly, instead of seeking blame, retribution, or even forgiveness, then we would know what to do, without question.