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Duly Consider: Land of the Free? »
Posted by: trnscndr 2 years, 7 months agoThat the US is no longer the freest nation on the planet is one that draws more consensus than the popularity of our President as we become aware that more and a higher population per capita in the US is under strict control of our prison system than anywhere in the world. Stats released in the fall confirm that we break a new record. And records a
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trnscndr
1)Of all my political tenets the one I know to be true is that emotional politicians who ignore logic are enemies of the state ...
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Comments: 428
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populist
May 22, 2007, 1:13 p.m.The Constitution and the Bill of Rights are the guidelines for the government in this country. But, sadly, for decades and decades, politicians on both sides of the aisle have violated them with near impunity.
We've allowed these people to have too much power for far too long. The result?
Instead of being a country that respects liberty, we now have a government that lies to us, spies on us, watches our bank accounts, listens to our phone calls, reads our emails, wages aggressive foreign wars, spends billions and billions to prop up evil dictators and on and on and on.
We need to turn this mess around.
Some reading on this:
"What Happened to the Land of the Free?"
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trnscndr
May 22, 2007, 1:20 p.m.There is a very conscious effort to make sure the ones most likely to participate in a revolution are in prison; they just happen to be recreational drug users, go figger!
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jovial
May 22, 2007, 1:27 p.m.Incarceration, prison, parole are all terms that we as Americans are familiar with. Most people have at least one family member or friend that at one time was part of the criminal justice system in America. The prisons don't work on the principle of rehabilitation, but on the sole purpose of punishment. Locking up someone for using illegal drugs is a crime in itself. Rehabilitation and drug halfway houses have seen their funding cut drastically. Here is a list of proposed cuts by this administration in 2008.
http://edworkforce.house.gov/publications/fy08e...
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HannibalBarca
May 22, 2007, 1:59 p.m.Times haven't changed,didn't Bob Dylan or was it John lennon get ridiculed in the early 70's for writting a song about a person being sent to prison for two Jts., he got 7 years. Think it was Lennon but not sure
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elel
May 22, 2007, 2:13 p.m.I don't remember now where or from who I heard this, nor the correct quote, but it always stuck with me and I agree. The most detrimental side effect or ill cause from the use of marijuana was the jail term.
I never understood mandatory jail sentences, geesh isn't that why we have judges?
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eugenegerard
May 22, 2007, 3:25 p.m.May 3rd or 4th Bush signed a Presidential Order that has gotten zero play by the press. Basically if a 911 happens, he takes full rein of the government and the other two equal parts of our Constitutional government become purely advisory in nature. He has full Marshall Law powers. he answers to NO ONE.
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el-jefe
May 22, 2007, 3:39 p.m.You keep talking about liberty and freedom.
And my answer is, you blather too much about Roe vs. Wade and not enough about Wickard vs. Filburn.
Once that piece of judicial doublethink is disposed of, maybe we can do something about that state of emergency that is declared to be still in force at the start of every Congress...
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ameliog
May 22, 2007, 3:49 p.m."On face value, we have bought into the idea that they are all drug dealers and contribute to violent crime..."
That's my parent's (bless them) perspective. They accept current sloganeering and confuse it with actual facts. How can we ever begin to address the problems in our system if we can't take off our America-the-greatest filters and look objectively at the issues? I can't reconcile our claim of being the land of the free with the highest incarceration rate in the world.
We keep locking people up and the problem only gets worse...it's the classical definition of insanity.
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AmericanIdiot
May 22, 2007, 3:54 p.m."duly consider" has become a tracking site full of cookies and G*d knows what else. Beware!
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anioklyComment has been removed: User banned.
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davideley
May 22, 2007, 5:23 p.m.Scrolling down--the answers are--John Lennon and the song was about John Sinclair. Lennon had their number but they didn't have his. Huge FBI file on the guy, Lennon, I mean,99% of which was redacted when released under the Freedom of Information Act. Lennon was also very forward-thinking when he supported the inmates who had rioted at Attica State Prison in New York back in the early Seventies.
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endtyranny
May 22, 2007, 6:13 p.m."According to the most recent statistics, from 1995 to 2003, inmates incarcerated in federal prisons for drug offenses have accounted for 49 percent of total prison population growth."
That's an astounding statistic. We're actually paying (out the wazoo, mind you) to put stoners and junkies behind bars. When they could be focusing on important crime, they choose to enforce laws that in many respects make no sense. We need to tell our government to stop wasting our time and money on victimless crimes and to reform drug laws.
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4cprocess
May 22, 2007, 6:49 p.m.I'm a staunch conservative on most issues but I've got to admit I'm probably more liberal on this issue than most liberals here.
Hell, I can't even open up a restaurant that will allow smoking in my community. Is smoking illegal?
I can't stroll in the park and smoke either.
If I stop and get ONE beer for the ride home from work and get pulled over, I can go to jail! Even if I'm not even close to being intoxicated. Oh yeah, and don't let me leave the empty because if they pulled me over tomorrow I could get a ticket for that too!
My employer can force me to give up my body fluids to determine if I may have toked a stogie on my vacation!
The IRS can confiscate my property if I can't pay them.
The game warden can confiscate my truck if my buddy kills the wrong duck.
Wake up people, our rights are not disappearing, they're already gone!
In God We Trust
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perkonis
May 22, 2007, 7:01 p.m."Now, it seems to me, if I wanted to get elected to congress, each of those talking points would get me votes, and that makes us the greatest Democracy in the world, right? Wrong!"
This is actually the part that bothers me the most. So long as a candidate can spew something that sounds good in a 30 second sound bite on the six o' clock news, sheeple will vote for them. It doesn't matter if their proposal makes sense, it just has to sound good and play well for the camera.
It's a disturbing way to elect someone.
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Antitax
May 22, 2007, 7:45 p.m.When the author shows the compassion for the victims of these jail house thugs that he seems to feel for them, then he weill have some credibility. Until then . . . do a crime, do the time. Simple and deserved.
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0gramstransfat
May 22, 2007, 7:55 p.m.Coporations have more freedom in this country than its citizens. The U.S. Government will defend the rights and practices of these corporations quicker than it will defend the basic human rights of the citizens it is supposed to protect.
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pdqwick
May 22, 2007, 8:13 p.m.This article has to have been written by a moron who is clueless about democracy, American history, and world history.
Freedom in a democracy applies to law abiding citizens not subjected to the rule of an oppressive or tyrannical gov't. with oppressive laws; not to criminals who have abused their freedom and the freedom of others.
Most prisoners in America are there because they have committed serious crimes, some multiple.
People are not imprisoned in America for political reasons, but the left is doing their best to make violating political correctness against the law and punishable by imprisonment.
Is our system perfect? Of course not, but I believe it is still the best one going. How many nations in ther world or even in the history of the world have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to keep and bear arms, the right to peaceably assemble for political dissent, etc.?
Freedom is one of the values worth fighting and dying for. Live free or die!
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Natureboy
May 22, 2007, 8:52 p.m."How many nations in ther world or even in the history of the world have ...the right to peaceably assemble for political dissent, etc.? "
Really, you're cracking me up. Do you have any idea how many people have been spied on, beaten, arrested, tear-gassed, pepper-sprayed, and shot with rubber bullets (or even lead ones) for daring to excercise that right?
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4cprocess
May 22, 2007, 9:06 p.m.Then keep footin the bill so every politician that comes along to any public funded college can just suck up all your tax dollars to spew one point of veiw to your children.
Yeah, that's democracy alright.
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agentX
May 22, 2007, 9:34 p.m."If you steal billions of dollars from investors by fraud and have a good lawyer (and you will because you are rich) you will never do a day in prison."
Not necessarily true. The guy in the Enron scandal, Ken Lay, did get prison time, but he died before he got there. How 'convenient'.
"Clearly, these laws have nothing to do with criminality, but are intended to enforce a moral code inflicted by a small religious faction in America who use fear mongering to scare the rest of us into passing laws to put people they hate in prison."
Yeah, gotta love those Puritans. Their backward lifestyle still affects America even after 200 years.
And those laws will still be there, as long as crime profiteers need to keep the jails full so they can justify building more prisons.
At least Vermont has the right idea- furlough non-violent offenders.
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SlapALib
May 22, 2007, 9:47 p.m.So laws against child molestation are just an inflicted moral code?
Telling. . .
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