After decades of tough-on-crime policies that swelled California prisons to the point that they had to be depopulated under a Supreme Court order, support has mounted for rethinking criminal punishment. Full Article
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People in this country have some sort of group addiction to punishing other people. They know they have more pressing things to spend money on than more prisons, like halting the increasing infant mortality rate or keeping the roads and water pipes from crumbling away, but nothing gives them the rush like seeing an offender caged. Nonetheless, they decide to let a handful of drug offenders free, give themselves a liberal pat on the back, but immediately increase the sentences on sx offenses. It is like they think they are controlling their alcoholism by holding off on the whiskey for a day and choosing to drink vodka.
I am afraid they will have to hit bottom, like the Germans did in the thirties, before anything changes.