SALEM -- The Oregon Supreme Court has ruled in favor with Gov.
John Kitzhaber, who has halted the execution of death row inmate
Gary Haugen as long as he is governor.  The court rejected
Haugen's argument that postponing his death was cruel and
unusual punishment.  The governor has clemency power in death
penalty cases, the court ruled, and there is nothing in the law
to allow the recipient of clemency to reject it.  The court did
not weigh the merits of Kitzhaber's decision, only whether he
had the legal right to make it.  Judges also agreed that having
to wait on death row exacts a toll on the person awaiting death
but the U.S. Supreme Court has already ruled that uncertain time
spent on death row is not cruel and unusual punishment.    But
the governor said in 2011 that he's long regretted his decision
to allow those executions, and he's come to believe that Oregon
voters did not intend to create a death penalty scheme in which
the only inmates who are put to death are those who volunteer.
Thursday, he is