They killed him (eventually)

They're obsessed with car accidents here. Whatever channel you watch, the nightly news always reports the daily death toll from car accidents and shows footage from the worst ones. Someone told me that Spain has one of the highest traffic-related death rates in Europe and that the news coverage is meant to increase awareness and encourage people to drive more carefully. Makes me wonder how much say the government has in what gets shown on TV, but for now that's not the point. The point is this: Normally the day's car accidents are the lead story on the news; tonight it was that it took 90 minutes to execute that guy in Ohio. I couldn't understand everything they were saying, as usual, but the newscaster's tone was really grave, and they were clearly reporting this as a tragedy. Also, when talking about the execution they used the verb asesinar, which means to assassinate or murder. No euphemisms here. The BBC covered the story in a similar, if slightly more impartial, tone, pointing out that in some states people can still be executed by hanging or firing squad and that witnesses (spectators?) can be present at executions.

I realize that my summarizing two news stories doesn't exactly constitute hard evidence, but trust me. Europe thinks we're barbarians. Maybe a moot point, though, since being pro-death penalty seems to correlate with not giving a fuck what Europe thinks.