NY Repuke-candidate: Prison dorms for welfare recipients

[kpete]

NY candidate: Prison dorms for welfare recipients
AP


By BETH FOUHY, Associated Press Writer Beth Fouhy, Associated Press Writer – Sat Aug 21, 5:19 pm ET

NEW YORK – Republican candidate for governor Carl Paladino said he would transform some New York prisons into dormitories for welfare recipients, where they could work in state-sponsored jobs, get employment training and take lessons in "personal hygiene."

Paladino, a wealthy Buffalo real estate developer popular with many tea party activists, isn't saying the state should jail poor people: The program would be voluntary.

But the suggestion that poor families would be better off in remote institutions, rather than among friends and family in their own neighborhoods, struck some anti-poverty activists as insulting.

Paladino is competing for the Republican nomination with former U.S. Rep. Rick Lazio. The primary is Sept. 14.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100821/ap_on_el_gu/us_paladino_welfare

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. Call them what you want to, still sounds like a debtors' prison.

And "lessons in personal hygiene"? How insulting.

[whistler162]

2. The correct term is Poor House.....

and I am sure Mr. Paladino would make a good Mr. Brumble

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. Indeed. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poorhouse

[smitra]

5. Very true. So who's going to be writing the 21st century version of "Oliver Twist?" n/t

[Brickbat]

4. The CCC provided such lessons.

FWIW.

[izquierdista]

6. Not even a new idea

Oscar Goodman, the mayor of Las Vegas, was pimping this idea 10 years ago as a way to use the empty prison sitting in Jean, NV after the new one opened north of town. He figured it was a good place to relocate the homeless from downtown Las Vegas.

I got a better idea. Why not use eminent domain to take over eyesores that some developer went bust on and put those properties to use? Almost every town has boarded up buildings that are waiting for the capital fairy to wave her moneyed wand over.

[Historic NY]

7. There are lots of empty almost abandoned NY facilities beside prisons...

former state hospital complexes, office complexes, etc. all decaying. many in the urban areas that actually could serve people.

[dionysus]

8. jesus christ. he manages to make lazio look sane.

[Suich]

9. This is the best line in the article:

"...while prison guards would be retrained to work as counselors..."

:rofl: