Bush Admin Lax on Civil Rights Enforcement
I see the change jar is gettin kinda full, s'there enuff room for my two cents?
Prisons. They are entirely overpopulated just for starters. For Non-Violent criminals, get those poor bastards out of the gray bar hotels and into the streets for public floggings, humiliations and such. Lop a finger for a theft conviction, lop a hand for the second. There are countries who have instituted the 'death penalty' for drunk driving. Obviously their DUI rate is near zero. So, I say lop their li'l buddy off for a convicted rapists 1st offense - hell, maybe even a frontal lobotomy for the second.
Also agreed, prisons are a place where simpletons are nurtured into better than average crooks. For the lazy, prisons provide
more than three hots and a cot - for trustee's they offer cells with carpeting, books and all the niceties of home. They can have conjugal visits - cable tv and weight rooms (let alone all the college degrees they can choke down). It's disgusting, not to mention I hear tell we taxpayers spend anywhere from $50,000 a year to $200,000 a year PER CONVICT :blink: (ok, whose pockets are getting fat here?)
Try this on for size. Make each prison capable of producing its own electricity - with the power coming solely from the inmates. Let 'em run a tread mill or manually scoop water or dirt or
whatever, they must supply their own power and each inmate must contribute via
manual labor. Let them grow their own food and make their own clothes. dispose of their own wastes, etc. Make various prisons manufacture different items and then trade with the other prisons. If prison A doesn't make work pants, then they trade some of their beef with prison B, which does.
In other words, make each prison self sufficient - and then the whole system self sufficient. This way taxpayers end up
not only paying out no tax dollars, but also reap the benefits of having a prison in their own back yard by being able to purchase whatever it is the prison manufactures at a very nice price. I have a medium security prison less than four miles from where I live; wouldn't it be nice to wonder over there and get a nice pair of handmade shoes or something for $10 or $20?
Recidivism is at an alarming rate - geez, I wonder why? It's easier to go back then it is to stay out here. Make the work hard enough while they are there that they do not want to return and give them skills they can actually use in society. Maybe when the prisons start churning out people with skills, the labor market will absorb instead of shun them.
How does that little diddy go? Give a man a fish, he will eat for a day. Teach him how, he will eat for a lifetime.
It would have to be my guess that some bureaucracy is getting lots of money from the US having so many prisoners at any given time. This is another prime example of how certain things
need to change - but truly never will because those who make the decisions are living in self interest.
