Why We Must Fix Our Prisons By Senator Jim Webb

[underpants]

http://www.parade.com/news/2009/03/why-we-must-fix-our-prisons.html

America's criminal justice system has deteriorated to the point that it is a national disgrace. Its irregularities and inequities cut against the notion that we are a society founded on fundamental fairness. Our failure to address this problem has caused the nation's prisons to burst their seams with massive overcrowding, even as our neighborhoods have become more dangerous. We are wasting billions of dollars and diminishing millions of lives.

Our overcrowded, ill-managed prison systems are places of violence, physical abuse, and hate, making them breeding grounds that perpetuate and magnify the same types of behavior we purport to fear. Post-incarceration re-entry programs are haphazard or, in some places, nonexistent, making it more difficult for former offenders who wish to overcome the stigma of having done prison time and become full, contributing members of society. And, in the face of the movement toward mass incarceration, law-enforcement officials in many parts of the U.S. have been overwhelmed and unable to address a dangerous wave of organized, frequently violent gang activity, much of it run by leaders who are based in other countries.

With so many of our citizens in prison compared with the rest of the world, there are only two possibilities: Either we are home to the most evil people on earth or we are doing something different--and vastly counterproductive. Obviously, the answer is the latter.

Over the past two decades, we have been incarcerating more and more people for nonviolent crimes and for acts that are driven by mental illness or drug dependence. The U.S. Department of Justice estimates that 16% of the adult inmates in American prisons and jails--which means more than 350,000 of those locked up--suffer from mental illness, and the percentage in juvenile custody is even higher. Our correctional institutions are also heavily populated by the "criminally ill," including inmates who suffer from HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and hepatitis.

Against this backdrop of chaos and mismanagement, a dangerous form of organized and sometimes deadly gang activity has infiltrated America's towns and cities. It comes largely from our country's southern border, and much of the criminal activity centers around the movement of illegal drugs. The weapons and tactics involved are of the highest order.

In short, we are not protecting our citizens from the increasing danger of criminals who perpetrate violence and intimidation as a way of life, and we are locking up too many people who do not belong in jail. It is incumbent on our national leadership to find a way to fix our prison system. I believe that American ingenuity can discover better ways to deal with the problems of drugs and nonviolent criminal behavior while still minimizing violent crime and large-scale gang activity. And we all deserve to live in a country made better by such changes.

It's time to change the law
By Senator Jim Webb
http://www.parade.com/news/2009/03/its-time-to-change-the-law.html

I am now introducing legislation that will create a national commission to look at every aspect of our criminal justice system with an eye toward reshaping the process from top to bottom. I believe that it is time to bring together the best minds in America to confer, report, and make specific recommendations about how we can reform the process. This commission will be tasked with giving us clear answers to hard questions, including:
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[HereSince1628]

1. Undocumented immigrants do crimes that Americans won't do?

Now, even the criminal trades are being undermined by cheap foreign labor?

We are on the road to a whole new set of meanings to "bail-out."

[PDJane]

2. Jails are best run by the government.

Time to nationalize the jails, too. Get them working properly, and then look at the penal code and mandatory sentencing. Mandatory sentencing doesn't work well, but the current private jail system lobbies for them! Of course, they make more money that way.....

[biopowertoday]

3. The problem is that even lots of Dems have the mentality of

lock em up and throw away the key. Good for Webb. but a study will take years and lots of money. meanwhile there are strategies that work that this money would be used for.

[underpants]

4. Anyone who dares to mention this gets branded "soft on crime"

and all of the campaign "experts" have convinced themselves that that is a career ender for candidates so it is basically ignored and the jail industry thrives--they are getting into the "too big to fail" category

The war on Drugs is more aptly called the War on Votes.

[biopowertoday]

6. WELL, it is past time they

grew some balls-or ovaries. simple answer I know but.............

[grasswire]

5. follow the dollar, Sen. Webb

The prison industrial complex, in cahoots with politicians, has suckered America out of a fortune. That tax money could have gone to schools, parks, culture, other amenities of society, but it went to paying upwards of $35,000 per year to house each one of hundreds of thousands of petty property offenders or non-violent offenders -- people who could be "corrected" in other ways.

I hope Senator Webb understands that he has to address the hold that the profiteers have on policy. Good luck bucking that.

[w4rma]

7. Sen. Webb is one of our best Senaors. (nt)

[ChimpersMcSmirkers]

8. We need more Jim Webbs in the Senate. His sense of justice is strong,

and he fights hard for it. He's not the most liberal senator, but I think he's one of the most honest.

[MISSDem]

9. Some of the prisons are so bad, ie, Parchman in Mississippi,

that once someone has been there, some say, they should never be let out. It creates vicious, unfeeling beings.

[salguine]

10. This is what you get when you have a for-profit prison system.