[Sparrow_temp]

There should be no question that we should incarcerate those that break the law. The real question is why is it costing so much? Do something to reduce the cost of housing these people. If there's prison overcrowding, prisoners should be executed rather than released early to make more room. Reduce all of the amenities that prisoners receive. Take away the weight lifting facilities for one - no reason to create monsters there. Force all of the prisoners to work in chain gangs to get something out of them.

For the violent offenders, simply start executing more prisoners. You got an illegal alien who committed a crime -- kill him. Somebody tries to escape -- shoot to kill. Repeat offenders -- kill them before they reach prison. These were acceptable practices at one time. The ACLU and other bleeding hearts are responsible for the huge numbers of people we spend an incredible amount of money on to simply store rather than execute.

How about we stay executions only if private organizations like the ACLU pay for the costs of storing these subhumans? Miss a payment and the prisoner dies. Limitless appeals should be a thing of the past. If it costs more to execute somebody, there's something seriously wrong with the system. Force the defense to pay for the prosecution on any lost appeals.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio has the right idea but there should also be a way to reduce the size of the prison population that consists of the worst offenders.

[Peter B]

This is all well & good but my point is that prison should have folks who are a danger to others populating them. Rapists, murderers, theives, those who assault others, etc. We do not need prisons where half the population is there for NON violent offenses. Someone who was arrested with a bag of dope should not be a guest of the state for 10+ years. That is beyond absurd IMO. Our prisons are so crowded due to incacerating people who have broken an oftentimes stupid, archaic law where a judge has no discretion. More common sense needs to be applied to the whole equation but prisons employ many folks in areas where there are no other jobs, hence keeping them filled keeps voters happy

Originally Posted by Sparrow_temp

There should be no question that we should incarcerate those that break the law. The real question is why is it costing so much? Do something to reduce the cost of housing these people. If there's prison overcrowding, prisoners should be executed rather than released early to make more room. Reduce all of the amenities that prisoners receive. Take away the weight lifting facilities for one - no reason to create monsters there. Force all of the prisoners to work in chain gangs to get something out of them.

For the violent offenders, simply start executing more prisoners. You got an illegal alien who committed a crime -- kill him. Somebody tries to escape -- shoot to kill. Repeat offenders -- kill them before they reach prison. These were acceptable practices at one time. The ACLU and other bleeding hearts are responsible for the huge numbers of people we spend an incredible amount of money on to simply store rather than execute.

How about we stay executions only if private organizations like the ACLU pay for the costs of storing these subhumans? Miss a payment and the prisoner dies. Limitless appeals should be a thing of the past. If it costs more to execute somebody, there's something seriously wrong with the system. Force the defense to pay for the prosecution on any lost appeals.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio has the right idea but there should also be a way to reduce the size of the prison population that consists of the worst offenders.

[northstar22]

Originally Posted by Sparrow_temp

There should be no question that we should incarcerate those that break the law. The real question is why is it costing so much? Do something to reduce the cost of housing these people. If there's prison overcrowding, prisoners should be executed rather than released early to make more room. Reduce all of the amenities that prisoners receive. Take away the weight lifting facilities for one - no reason to create monsters there. Force all of the prisoners to work in chain gangs to get something out of them.

For the violent offenders, simply start executing more prisoners. You got an illegal alien who committed a crime -- kill him. Somebody tries to escape -- shoot to kill. Repeat offenders -- kill them before they reach prison. These were acceptable practices at one time. The ACLU and other bleeding hearts are responsible for the huge numbers of people we spend an incredible amount of money on to simply store rather than execute.

How about we stay executions only if private organizations like the ACLU pay for the costs of storing these subhumans? Miss a payment and the prisoner dies. Limitless appeals should be a thing of the past. If it costs more to execute somebody, there's something seriously wrong with the system. Force the defense to pay for the prosecution on any lost appeals.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio has the right idea but there should also be a way to reduce the size of the prison population that consists of the worst offenders.

Michigan was one of the world's first places to abolish the death penalty -- we did it back in 1842. That's something I'm proud of as a Michigander. If you want to execute "subhumans," move to Texas, Yemen, Afghanistan or Iran -- we don't kill people in Michigan!

Besides the obvious problem of executing an innocent person (which DOES happen -- it's occurred more than once in Texas and Florida), capital punishment actually increases violent crime rates and puts victims' families through years of hell waiting for someone to be executed. By the way -- if you have the death penalty and take away appeals, many INNOCENT people will DIE (and guilty criminals will go free). Hundreds of innocent people have been exonerated from death row, or proven not guilty after their executions.

A much more effective way of reducing the prison population is to release nonviolent drug offenders who shouldn't be in prison, anyway. Locking someone up for possessing a small amount of marijuana is ridiculous.

[malamute]

Originally Posted by Peter B

This is all well & good but my point is that prison should have folks who are a danger to others populating them. Rapists, murderers, theives, those who assault others, etc. We do not need prisons where half the population is there for NON violent offenses. Someone who was arrested with a bag of dope should not be a guest of the state for 10+ years. That is beyond absurd IMO. Our prisons are so crowded due to incacerating people who have broken an oftentimes stupid, archaic law where a judge has no discretion. More common sense needs to be applied to the whole equation but prisons employ many folks in areas where there are no other jobs, hence keeping them filled keeps voters happy

Someone with a big bag of dope is a drug trafficker and there is no worse kind of scum than a drug trafficker.

Michigan already obviously has medical marijuana so it's basically been legalized there. I was just there and saw all the pot stores everywhere.

If your crime rate didn't drop then you can't blame pot laws now.

[VM1138]

I understand people being excited about Sherriff Joe reforming the prison system, and a lot of what he does works, but if this becomes widespread the economy will further tank. Who needs to hire laborers when they can hire some prisoners to do a bunch of work for .28 cents an hour?

EDIT: And it's true that prisons should be reserved for those who are a danger to society. Drug users should not be penalized as much. There are a lot of different models for dealing with drug users. Now, drug dealers on the other hand, are a continuing menace to society and should be imprisoned for a long time. But users should get jail-time, or very short prison sentences. Nothing like a heroin addict getting a longer sentence than a murderer or a rapist to reveal the strangeness of the judicial system.

[VM1138]

Originally Posted by northstar22

Michigan was one of the world's first places to abolish the death penalty -- we did it back in 1842. That's something I'm proud of as a Michigander. If you want to execute "subhumans," move to Texas, Yemen, Afghanistan or Iran -- we don't kill people in Michigan!

Besides the obvious problem of executing an innocent person (which DOES happen -- it's occurred more than once in Texas and Florida), capital punishment actually increases violent crime rates and puts victims' families through years of hell waiting for someone to be executed.

I agree in principle with what you're saying, but I'd have to see some sort of evidence that violent crime goes up due to capital punishment. That relationship seems awfully spurious to me.

And for the record I am against the death penalty.

[Sparrow_temp]

I basically agree with you. I kind of wish we could just do away with the violent offenders though. There are way too man laws on the books. I feel like at any given time I'm probably in violation of something. There should be an expiration period on all of these laws so if Congress doesn't renew them they disappear off the books. This serves two purposes -- it would reduce the number of laws and keep the legislature busy renewing the important laws.

Most of the drug infractions would be better served by the offender paying rather large fines so money would be coming in rather than putting them behind bars where money would have to be spent on them. If there's a war on drugs in this country, then we lost. If you're going to fight a war, then you kill people -- not arrest them. The only thing the "war" did was put large sums of money into the drug trade. We'd be better off just surrendering and legalizing most drugs if we're just going to do what we've been doing.

Originally Posted by Peter B

This is all well & good but my point is that prison should have folks who are a danger to others populating them. Rapists, murderers, theives, those who assault others, etc. We do not need prisons where half the population is there for NON violent offenses. Someone who was arrested with a bag of dope should not be a guest of the state for 10+ years. That is beyond absurd IMO. Our prisons are so crowded due to incacerating people who have broken an oftentimes stupid, archaic law where a judge has no discretion. More common sense needs to be applied to the whole equation but prisons employ many folks in areas where there are no other jobs, hence keeping them filled keeps voters happy

[northstar22]

Law enforcement is not a war. The mission of law enforcement is to protect the populace, not kill people. We can't sink to criminal levels to punish crime.