Hallelujah....the number of people being sentenced to death in the U.S. is declining. Read the comments by an Oregon prosecutor who seem to support the drop, thinking that the death penalty should be reserved for the worst of the worst.

"The point we're coming to in America is that we are going to keep refining and refining and refining those who are eligible for the death penalty," said Josh Marquis, the prosecutor for Clatsop County in Astoria, Oregon. "It should really be reserved for people like (Oklahoma City bomber) Timothy McVeigh," added Marquis, a death penalty proponent who chairs the Capital Litigation Committee of the National District Attorneys Association.

Given growing support for what Marquis called "true life" -- laws that provide no parole options, even Texas -- which has executed more in the modern era than any other state -- has begun to move toward a life-with-no-parole option, he said.

While we don't agree that Timothy McVeigh should have been executed, we welcome the shift in thinking. It's a start.