The overall violent crime rate may be down; I haven’t studied the latest trends. However, you can’t tell me that arresting non-violent offenders makes us safer (which is what this review and documentary is primarily about). Many who start out as non-violent drug users go on to commit other crimes to support their habit while others get into dealing because of the huge money making potential.

If we legalized activities which do not violate the life, liberty, and property of others, I’m convinced that violent crime would go down much lower than it is. Ending the war on (some) drugs would put the drug cartels out of business and would rid organized crime of a major revenue stream.

I guess I should have been more clear on that point.

Even if the decline in serious crime is due to those treatment programs, those treatment programs are a part of the overall crime policy…which means that it’s working and doesn’t need to be replaced in its entirety but rather just tinkered with here and there. Regardless of whether people think the policy ought to be amended to achieve this goal or that goal, they need to first accept that the current policy is resulting in lower crime or doesn’t affect the crime rate instead of claiming that it’s not working because crime is supposedly out of control when, in fact, it’s on the decline.

The reason serious crime is in decline could very well be the increasing use of inmate treatment programs around the country, and not a result of improved law enforcement.

Either safeness (or lack thereof) of our streets is in large part due to crime-targeting policies or it isn’t.

If it is, then it’s pretty clear that the policies are working. Crimes, both reported and unreported, are falling and reporting of crimes is up (which could also be a bad thing, depending on how you look at it (if you’re a man who’s been arrested for rape or domestic violence, I’m sure there’s a good chance that you don’t think that increased reporting of alleged crimes to the police is a good thing)). Our streets are safer than they’ve probably ever been.

If it isn’t, then it’s pointless to talk crime-targeting policies as the solution to or cause of the problems (or solutions).

You can’t have it both ways.

I believe the purpose of prisons *should* be to punish violent offenders who have either threatened or taken the life, liberty, or property of a non-consenting other person. The worst violent offenders should be separated from society altogether as they have proven that they can’t play well with others (there’s no purpose in ‘rehabilitating’ a murder). I get into greater detail on this point here http://www.thelibertypapers.org/2009/04/11/reforming-americas-prison-system-the-time-has-come/

Unfortunately, as we both know prisons are being used not only to punish those that fit the criteria above but also to punish those who do something most people find “immoral” (i.e. vices such as drug abuse, prostitution, and gambling). More often than not, those who get put away for these “crimes” become real criminals as their pasts make it difficult to make better decisions in the future as they try to find a place to work and live.

This is the reality we live in. While I agree with you in principle that prisons should be used to punish rather than “correct” behavior, as long as we have people being locked up for “immoral” behavior, I believe it makes more sense to go the remediation route as opposed to the punitive route. Many of these people do get out of prison eventually and it’s in everyone’s best interest that they come out better than they came in…well, everyone but those who depend on the prison industrial complex.

You both touched on something I didn’t mention in the review that is important in understanding why things are the way they are; myself and others refer to this as the prison industrial complex. Much of the reason that politicians don’t want to keep recidivism from occurring is the special interests who rely on a large prison population (i.e. corrections officers, police, contractors, and sadly construction). If the types of reforms that I advocate were adopted, such as 1.) pardoning all non-violent drug offenders and 2.) legalizing the distribution, sale, and use of drugs we would cut the prison population in half (probably cut it closer to 60%). This would be great news for taxpayers but terrible news for the special interests who rely on the prison industrial complex.

I work with Humane Exposures Films, the producers of “It’s More Expensive to Do Nothing,” and I’d like to thank you for the detailed, insightful review.

I also want to address one issue you raised: Who is opposed to funding these very cost-effective programs? Take a look at who financed the campaign against SB618 in California: the correctional officers union.

Yup, it’s that simple — and that disgusting. Inmates mean job security for the corrections unions.

There’s three things keeping the penal system going:

1. It’s a jobs program for law enforcement and “corrections” officers, and administrators.

2. Non-offending people ARE actually safer when offenders are imprisoned (the problem is, what happens when they get out).

3. The punitive principle.

We feel that people who do bad should be PUNISHED.

Punishment isn’t SUPPOSED to “help” them. Punishment isn’t supposed to “rehabilitate” them.

The very term “department of corrections” is a hypocritical misnomer.

Americans (and to a large extent most other cultures), put people in prison to punish them, not to “fix” them.

“Corrections”, “penal”, “penitentiary”… All high minded BS myths.

The reason “Sheriff Joe” is so popular, despite being the worst sort of scum, is because he reassures people that he is “punishing the bad guys”; and THAT is honestly what people want.

Eastern State Penitentiary, the first “modern” penitentiary style prison, was deliberately fashioned to resemble monks cells (which is where we got the name for inmate housing units), in the belief that isolation, contemplation, prayer, and penitence (thus the name), would reform criminals into decent men.

It was held up as the new “humane” model. In reality it drove prisoners mad and they killed themselves, and each other, in droves.

So long as we refuse to acknowledge the true purpose behind “custodial sentencing” and pretend it has anything to do with the offender coming out better on the other side, we are stuck with what we’ve got (And rapidly getting worse).

We have to stop pretending that punishment does anything but feed our base emotions.

We have to stop pretending that the negative prospect of prison is sufficient to deter criminals from committing crimes. Most criminals by nature have a poor appreciation for consequences, poor impulse control, and an inability to make valid risk/reward calculations.

When you put a criminal away, all you are doing is warehousing him where he can’t commit that crime anymore.

That does serve a valid purpose, but it costs a huge amount of money, and doesn’t fix the problem.

I’m going to put my plan for criminal justice reform down separately, It’s a little long for a comment.

It doesn’t matter that the program targets the non-violent. One B&E gone wrong the results in a kidnapping or murder will crush some politician’s career. Maybe more than one politician.

And pols are risk averse.

Rooting out the number-one cash crop in the land burns tax dollars instead of booking them. Arresting Americans for gardening empowers outlaws to take over Mexico. Political prisoner Marc Emery’s crime was to keep Madame Secretary Clinton’s promise to Calderon. Emery sold seed to American farmers, reducing U. S. demand for Mexican pot.

Prison flushes lives down expensive tubes, paid for by our descendants. My shaman’s second opinion is that psychoactive plants are God’s gift. Behold, it’s all good. When Eve ate the apple, she knew a good apple, and evil prohibition. The DEA says, “We don’t need no stinking amendment.”

Nixon passed the CSA (Controlled Substances Act of 1970) on the false assurance that the Schafer Commission would later justify criminalizing his enemies, but he underestimated Schafer’s integrity. No amendments can assure due process under an anti-science law without due process itself. Psychology hailed the breakthrough potential of LSD, until Schedule One shut down research, and pronounced that marijuana has no medical use.

The RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993) allows Native American Church members to eat peyote. Non-placebo sacraments remain prohibited to everybody else. Use of entheogen sacraments to mediate communion must be protected for all Americans, irrespective of church. Mortal lawmakers should not presume to thwart the intelligent design that molecular keys unlock spiritual doors.

Freedom of speech presupposes freedom of thought. The Constitution doesn’t enumerate any governmental power to embargo diverse states of mind. Legislators who would limit cognitive liberty lack jurisdiction. How and when did government usurp this power to coerce conformity? The Puritans sailed to escape coerced religious conformity, only to themselves coerce conformity on Quakers. Persons who appreciate their own free choice of path in life should tolerate seekers’ self-exploration.

Common-law holds that adults are the legal owners of their own bodies. The Founding Fathers undersigned that the God-given rights of liberty and the pursuit of happiness are inalienable. Socrates said to know your self. He paid the price of death cheerfully for corrupting youth by discussing the unjust hypocrisies of the powerful.