The US is the world's leading jailer. Do the Democrats care?

[High Plains]

The basic numbers are at the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/pjim05.htm

2.2 million in jail or prison, more than half of them for non-violent crimes. About 500,000 in jail or prison for drug offenses.

At the beginning of Richard Nixon's war on crime/war on drugs, the US prison population was 200,000. It has increased more than 10-fold since then. Crime rates have been declining for a decade (blip up this year), but the number of Americans in cages continues to grow.

We lead the world in prisoners per capita; we lead the world in absolute number of prisoners. This should be the shame of the nation. Oh, did I mention the disproportionate impact on blacks? One out of eight black men in his 20s is behind bars.

So, will Democrats do something about this? Or is this just another one of those social justice issues we decide we can't afford if we want to win elections?

[High Plains]

1. Dealing with social problems through mass imprisonment ...

...is not only inhumane, it is stupid and counterproductive. Almost all of those guys we send to prison are going to get out, you know. 600,000 a year right now, after getting advanced degrees in the college of criminal knowledge.

Gee, you think we could deal with this stuff proactively instead of reactively? Of course, that would require social investment...

[Triana]

2. Hate to say it but this is yet another issue...

...Democrats won't own. Like global warming, like torture, like healthcare, like myriad other issues they don't seem interested in defining as their own -- or interested in differentiating themselves from Republicans on. This gives the impression that "Democrats have no plan". They're either not saying anything, or no one is publicizing it if they are (yea, the friggin corprat-owned media is part of the problem). I think it's a combination of both.

Regardless the media problem -- why are Democrats so damn timid? With "Inconvenient Truth" out there -- they all ought to be all over the climate change/environmental issue like white on rice. But I hear nary a peep from them on this. Are they AFRAID of being associated with Gore? WHY? That's a cockamamie, lame excuse if that's it.

:wtf:

ONE thing they ARE FINALLY differentiating themselves on is Iraq. WHAT took them so long? And WHERE is that same level of noise on the other issues?

[Asgaya Dihi]

3. In this case it's not the media

This has been going on since the early 70's, it's not like someone hasn't had the time since to tell us that what we're doing doesn't work.

High Plains posted some stats above, here's a couple to go along with it for context. About 1/4 way down the first page you'll see a (slightly dated) chart showing our prison growth rates from 1925 through 2002. Second is our racial balance in prison after decades including both parties writing laws and holding power, and the last pair are the results with the two main drugs we did it all for.

No, it's not the media. It's cowardice. That was a reasonable price to pay so they could be "tough on crime" and not look soft in a 30 second sound-bite. They've had one campaign after another, one election debate after another, and one response to a State Of The Union Address or other chance after another over the years where they could have said anything they wanted to. This just wasn't what they wanted to say, and this built over decades.

http://www.sentencingproject.org/pdfs/pub9036.pdf
http://www.prisonsucks.com/
http://www.briancbennett.com/charts/death/cdc/opiates-yr.htm
http://www.briancbennett.com/charts/death/cdc/cocaine-yr.htm

The end results of it all has been nothing short of pure failure, death, and damage while the party of "principle" wrote or voted for about as many laws to bring it about as the "bad guys" did, it happened while both held power. We need a real change in leadership, a sense of right and wrong among our leaders that isn't held hostage to the easy sound-bite or poll.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Ths is a very tough issue. It's so easy for the tinpot demagogues

to rave and rage abot being "tough on crime," and so hard to bring any rationality to the dscussion because you immediately open yourself to attack for "coddling criminals," "turning loose the perverts and drug fiends to prey on our children," etc. The solution to every scial problem is a harsher penalty "so they'll think twice before they commit a crime." As if people were somehow 1) actually aware of the statutory penalties for various offenses, and as if they weighed those penalties as they contemplate their crimes.

I have spent most of the past decade and a half as a Corrections psychologist, and have lived these issues first-hand. I know that we could cut criminal recidivism by half with a combination of sane criminal penalty policies and a modest commitment of resources to various kinds of psychotherapy and rehabiitation programming. ("Rehabilitation s a bad choice of words, actually. Most people wouldn't have done their crimes if they had ever been "habilitated" in the frst place.)

[madrchsod]

5. no- it`s the kiss of death for a politician

to say anything negative about the death penalty. the stains of violence and death can no longer be washed from the fabric of our society. we have to discard the old and gain a new but the old fabric feels so comfortable

[kevinmc]

6. Here's one reason, There's a lot of money to be made .....

Prison construction firm GEO ups 2006 estimates

Prison construction firm GEO Group (GGI : 33.41, -0.78, -2.3% ) said it was revising higher its 2006 pro forma earnings and revenue guidance following its follow-on offering of 3 million shares, as higher occupancy levels at several of its existing facilities and new contract awards will absorb the dulitive impact. It now sees 2006 proforma earnings per share between $2.11 and $2.21, up by a penny, and lifted its revenue guidance by $10 million to a rnage of $770 million to $785 million. The proforma guidance excludes 14 cents a share in after-tax start-up expenses and discontinued operations as well as an after-tax write-off of 6 cents a share in deferred financing fees. Analysts polled by Thomson First Call were looking for earnings of $2.02 a share on revenue of $774 million.

http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/Story.aspx?guid=3efc75a9-500a-4cca-a94f-442114b9dc56&siteid=mktw&dist=MorePulse

[12string]

15. all about money

My fiance works as a nurse at a correctional facility so she receives "Corrections" magazine.It is unbelievable the amount of aftermarket advertising for eveything from food and medical services to instant portable jail facilities.We don't need more police or peisons.We need fewer laws.Whatever happened to "life,LIBERTY,and the pusuit of happiness.WE have lived in a police state far too long.

[High Plains]

7. How about a call for a moratorium on new prison construction?

[High Plains]

8. There are powerful special interests that benefit from imprisonment

The prison guards' unions. They are legendarily powerful in California, for example.

The architects, contractors, and suppliers who get rich building cages for Americans.

The cops, prosecutors, judges, probation and parole officers, etc. who depend on processing huge numbers of Americans as criminals for their livelihood. Shit, just by ending the drug prohibition alone, we could probably cut our police forces in half.

The politicians and moral entreprenuers who stoke the fears of voters...

[Asgaya Dihi]

10. Good points

There's an hour long audio documentary from American RadioWorks about the for profit aspect of our prison system and how the prison guards union creates and finances supposed "non-partisan" groups to do their dirty work for them, it also touches on how the for profit prison system actually writes some of our tough on crime laws. Worth a listen. You can listen by segment or there's a link to the full audio in the resources section toward the lower left side of the page.

http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/corrections/index.html

[Toots]

9. You seem to counter your own argument

"Crime rates have been declining for a decade (blip up this year), but the number of Americans in cages continues to grow."
Isn't that the whole purpose, to reduce crime?

[Asgaya Dihi]

11. I'd hoped High Plains would answer this

but since he hasn't yet I'll give it a shot. When more crimes are committed we have reason for more arrests, when less crimes are committed we have less reasons for arrest. When the crime rates are falling year after year but the rate of prison growth doesn't change there's a disconnect between the problem and the policy.

That aside the clearance rates for things like violent assault, arson, and others of the sort suck these days. While we lock up kids who hurt few but themselves in the drug war and fill our prisons with them we're forced to let out dangerous offenders because they aren't under a mandatory minimum. Drug violations are. That leaves us with problems like I'll quote below from the end of a document on the subject. The stats are misleading to say the least.

The figures which most clearly point out the failure of law enforcement policies are the so-called "clearance" rates. According to the FBI, "In the UCR Program, a law enforcement agency reports that an offense is cleared by arrest, or solved for crime reporting purposes, when at least one person is: Arrested. Charged with the commission of the offense. Turned over to the court for prosecution (whether following arrest, court summons, or police notice)." The UCR for 2004 reports that "In 2004, law enforcement agencies in the United States cleared 46.3 percent of violent crimes (murder, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault) and 16.5 percent of property crimes (burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft) brought to their attention. In addition, law enforcement cleared 17.1 percent of arson offenses, which are reported in a slightly different manner than the other property crimes."

http://www.drugwardistortions.org/distortion21.htm

[High Plains]

13. Yes, of course, we want reductions in crime.

The question is what is responsible for the decline for most of the past decade? Conservative ideologues like James Q. Wilson will argue simply that crime is down because we are imprisoning all the criminals. But honest criminologists will tell you they don't know, and they will point to a number of other factors: Changing demographics, end of the crack wars, a good economy...

The question is, why, after a decade of declining numbers of crimes does the number of people keep increasing in people keep increasing? It is increasing at a rate of more than 1,000 people a week. O

Finally, for now, let's assume that Wilson is correct and crime is down because of our heavy-handed sentencing policies. The question we must ask then is whether imprisoning 2.2 million people is the best way to achieve that goal? Might we have more success (and a more humane society)by addressing the causes of crime at the front end, instead of dealing with the consequences at the back end?

There is something seriously fucked up about a country that has to imprison 2.2 million of its citizens to feel safe. Land of the free, my ass.

[Selatius]

12. Democratic leaders won't bother with the issue.

They're too busy with "bigger fish to fry" like the war in Iraq or those budget busting deficits to care about poor folks in prison. The War on Drugs is a failure, and nobody has said anything about it. The Dem leaders don't seem to want to differentiate themselves from Republicans when it comes to our for-profit prison systems.

[spag68]

14. prison

Don't forget, you just have to put all those pot smoking hippies in jail to save our family's.

[sweetheart]

16. Are there any christians left?

Jesus christ would clearly, were he alive, be sided with the poor in this thinly-veiled
war against poor people. Rich people can afford to be addicted to "legal" drugs, by far
the largest addiction issue in the US, but the laws are there to screw the poor.

And the question really, is are the democrats the party of the poor? Are we a party
where john edward's approach develops a comprehensive stand on working-poor and drugs-poor
social equality drives us, or are we another party of the rich, just greener with better
ways of doing global domination and empire. As yet, too many dems look back to clinton
and wonder if we can't just do it again as vichy dems, as rich corporate neocons with
nicer clothes and fewer overt wars.

Jesus christ would be there with the poor, and if americans claim to be christians, then
the majority of ameicans should be standing against both mainstream partys demanding
a fair deal for the working person. Its not a war on drugs, its not trivial imprisonment.
Its a war against the poor to deprive the democrats of votes. Nixon understood that, and
the dems who don't understand it are just thick and part of the problem.