As some day it may happen that a victim must be found
I’ve got a little list — I’ve got a little list
Of society offenders who might well be underground
And who never would be missed — who never would be missed!
– Gilbert and Sullivan, The Mikado

There’s absolutely a handful of figures – all well known, all active in politics or business, all gladly engaging in behaviors that cause mass harm and sometimes death – that I might be inclined to try to murder assassinate. (Once you’re that famous, its assumed you have enemies who want to kill you, even if you’re just famous for being a Beatle and writing pop songs.)

I’m not sure I could pull the trigger, having ever killed anyone, but I and many many others have motive good enough for the courts, regardless of who actually kills them.

But yeah, even if I had a really, really good rifle and training to use it (or a hit-man glad to do it for me) it would be an act of desperation. I would not fault a starving man for stealing food, and would applaud a mother swiping medicine for her kids.

My mores drive me, instead, to remove these people from their positions of power without causing them harm, or even better, to reform them ( by way of Inception maybe) so that they conduct themselves with empathy and awareness of all the harm they might cause by their actions. But when we don’t have the capacity to do that, and they continue to cause harm, the knife in the night whispers.