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Private Prisons: Bernie Sanders is Right

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US Senator Bernie Sanders (allegedly a Vermont Independent, but running for president as a Democrat) and US Representatives Raul Grijalva (D-AZ), Keith Ellison (D-MN) and Bobby Rush (D-IL) introduced bills in Congress last week aiming to “ban private prisons, reinstate the federal parole system and eliminate quotas for the number of immigrants held in detention.” The bills won’t pass, and who knows what devils lurk in their details, but the general direction is right.

Americans should be embarrassed by the propensity of government at all levels to cage other Americans. We’ve often heard over the last few years that the US government imprisons a higher proportion of its own subject population than any other government on Earth. I doubt that’s true — the remaining Communist regimes and other dictatorships likely don’t honestly account for how many people they incarcerate — but the US certainly leads the “western democracies” in the matter. Nearly one in every 30 Americans is “under correctional supervision,” i.e. in jail, in prison, or on parole or probation.

As a libertarian, I’m all for “privatization.” I’d love to see as many services as possible taken out of government’s hands and left to the private sector.

But “private prisons” aren’t “private” in any meaningful sense of the word. They’re still operated under government supervision and according to government rules; they are still paid for with taxpayer dollars. Fake “privatization” of prisons creates two bad situations:

First, it creates a special interest lobby centered around how much money can be made by sticking people in cages. “Private prison” companies lobby for things like mandatory minimum sentences and a litany of new or revised “tough on crime” laws that put more and more non-violent criminals in their facilities to generate more and more profits. That lobby finances the campaigns of politicians who pass such laws. It’s good for business.

Second, it results in situations where no one is held accountable or responsible for abuses. When, for example a prisoner dies for lack of proper medical care, the politicians blame the “private prison” operators and the operators blame the politicians, round and round in a circle until someone’s wrist gets slapped and everyone forgets about it (until the next such incident).

I won’t vote for him, but Sanders is right on this. We should be looking for ways to minimize, or even abolish, imprisonment, not ways to pretend we’ve “privatized” it.

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Election 2016 Reminder: Who Needs Who?

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Memory has a way of playing tricks on the mind, but my recollection is that each of the seven presidential elections since I reached adulthood (I turned 18 the week after Ronald Reagan was re-elected in 1984) has been advertised — by the parties, by the candidates, by the media — as “the most important election of our lifetimes.”

Here comes the eighth. Same schtick,  even if the Jerry Springer atmospherics have been turned up a little. The world will end if Candidate X is elected. Americans will starve in the streets if Candidate Y isn’t elected. You know what I’m talking about.

Of course, each presidential election IS incredibly important to the parties, the candidates, and the media. Elections are their bread and butter. But are they really that consequential to the rest of us? On close examination, the only plausible answer is “no.”

Politicians of both major political parties trot out big plans and contrast those big plans with the big plans of the other candidates. Yes, those plans differ between the parties and from candidate to candidate, but only in degree, not kind. They all boil down to minor variations on the theme of  “let ME spend your money and run your lives.”

Look, I get it. I’m a politics junkie. I love the horse race, too. Like most Americans, I let myself get wrapped up in the dueling narratives.  Probably more so — I’ve been an activist at one level or another in every presidential election since 1992. It’s easy to forget that there’s more to life than politics. But there is.

Here’s a secret the politicians don’t want you to know: You don’t need them nearly as much as they need you. In fact, you need them like you need another hole in your head, while they need you desperately.

Without them, your life goes on. Without you, their careers screech to a halt.

Their conflicting plans are a  constant low-level social contaminant.  Sure, those plans vary by single-digit parts per million in content and composition, but that variation isn’t anything to obsess over.

We’d all be better off ignoring them until they close up their campaign offices, go home and get real jobs in the productive sector.

Okay, that’s probably not going to happen any time soon. But let’s at least commit to giving this new crop of presidential candidates the attention and respect actually due them instead of the attention and respect they demand. Turn their fake “debates” into a drinking game. Picture the various candidates in their underwear. Mentally preface each of their speeches with “if I was on drugs, I might say …”

But whatever you do, don’t take them seriously.

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Religion and Politics and Presidential Qualifications

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“Coexist” bumper sticker. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Religious belief as a qualification or disqualification for the presidency of the United States is an old can of worms. Dr. Ben Carson, a neurosurgeon running near the front of the pack for the Republican Party’s 2016 presidential nomination, cracked that can open and invited the body politic to feast on September 20 on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

“I would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation,” Carson told host Chuck Todd. In a follow-up interview with The Hill, Carson elaborated: “I do not believe Sharia is consistent with the Constitution of this country … Muslims feel that their religion is very much a part of your public life and what you do as a public official, and that’s inconsistent with our principles and our Constitution.”

Public response has been swift on both sides — affirmation from segments of the GOP base, including evangelical Christians and neoconservatives, outrage from civic-minded Muslims and, oddly, some “separation of church and state” advocates. Interestingly, US Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), also seeking the nomination, pointed out that the Constitution forbids “religious tests” for public office.

Cruz is right as far as he goes. A Muslim cannot be legally forbidden to seek, or be elected to, the presidency if he or she is otherwise constitutionally qualified.

On the other hand, voters are free to impose any tests they please when considering candidates. Mitt Romney’s Mormonism gave some voters pause in 2008 and 2012. John F. Kennedy’s Roman Catholic faith was a big issue in 1960, with critics wondering if he would “take his orders from the Pope.” If Carson continues in the top tier, his own Seventh Day Adventist beliefs might come under scrutiny.

I don’t come down in the moderate center very often, but that’s where I find myself here.

Most Americans adhere to some system of religious belief. I’m one of those Americans. I don’t consider that a disqualifier for public office. What I do expect from candidates vis a vis their religious beliefs are two things:

First, if their beliefs forbid them to do the job and follow the laws relating to the job (cough … Kim Davis), they should neither seek nor accept the job.

Secondly, even if their positions on issues are informed by their faith, they should be prepared to justify those positions, using reason and logic, to persons of other faiths (or of no faith) if they expect to be elected.

Like Carson, I admit to skepticism as to whether a devout Muslim would pass these tests. Unlike Carson, I put Christian candidates to the same test and give some of them — Baptist minister Mike Huckabee, for example — a failing grade.

Thomas L. Knapp is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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