Lets forget about murder, debating that isn't really going to resolve or prove much, regarding this topic. Murder is bad, and rarely excusable, and to the best of my knowlege is always a felony (let's not get anal justified murder or self-defense).
Replace 'murder' with 'assault' or 'vandalism' or your crime of choice in my examples. It's still valid. In one case, intentional malicious crime is not legally considered as bad as in another case, even though both cases were intentional, malicious and the actions and results are identical.
I'm not arguing that hate crime laws were not well intentioned. But a good idea in a supposed country of freedom, liberty and free speech? Not in my book. Even if they are carried out as intended, and not abused, they still should not be in existence, since they do one thing in bottom line effect: they are criminalizing specific thought as an additional charge or modifying charge to a sentence, instead of directly addressing the actions and basic intent(accident vs. intentional act, etc.).
Why should Bob get a different sentence if he intentionally keys Andy's car for fun, vs. keys Andy's car because he hates his skin color? Both are acts of purposeful vandalism, and I believe both should be dealt with the same seriousness/severity. Frankly, people have the right to think of someone or something else, in any way they like. It's what they actually physically do, in regards to violations of other people's rights/liberties, that must be addressed. At what point is it okay/more permissible to do X thing to a person intentionally for purposes of bias-free fun, as opposed to doing the same X thing intentionally for hate reasons?
For hate crime to be accepted as valid, for example, one has to accept that it is not that big of a deal if a guy of the same race, whom knows what he is doing(
he is sane and not suffering from some serious mental defect) paints random things on my/your house in acts of intentional vandalism for his personal fun to my/your property as opposed to if he was of a different race and did it for hate reasons? All other things equal(damage to house, value of damage, intentional destruction of property, etc.). So the 'for fun' intentional act is not that big of a deal?
What counts is the physical actions and basic intent(accident vs. intentional/willful destruction, violence, etc.) of a committed act. I fail to see where in one case, one should consider it less serious, than in another, based only on 'hate' thought, all other things held equal.
-Chris