Half of All U.S. Adults Have Immediate Family Member Currently or Previously Incarcerated

Going by these stats alone, essentially what this study is saying is that they are counting everyone who has spent a night in a drunk tank as being "incarcerated". And everyone who has spent three months in lockup for a misdemeanor. I don't think this is what most people think of when they think of "incarceration". As BahamaBob pointed out, only about 2.5% of the population has a felony conviction, i.e., they spent a year or more in prison, which translates to only about 14% of families, the 1 in 7 number listed above.

 

Why wont the OP answer? @Destroyer of illusions

 

I know Cuba is a big island but Guantanamo Bay is still US territory.

 

I also doubt the premise. Don't believe everything you read on the internet. In fact, believe very little of it. I don't doubt that we have a larger percentage of the population incarcerated than in prior years. Illegal immigration has certainly contributed to that. But the premise of the article is probably hyperbole.

 

In the GULag in the most "terrible" in 1937. According to researches of the doctor of historical sciences Polykhaev, throughout the territory of the USSR (14 republics — Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and so on — only 14) there were 820 thousand prisoners.
But this time in the USSR was after the revolution, civil war, intervention ... and so on. During the formation of statehood. And before the Soviet-Japanese war, the Soviet-Finnish war, the Second World War....Agree, it was a very difficult time for the USSR.
Now. In peacetime. In the 21st century. In the US, more than 2.3 million prisoners. And where is the "Bloody regime"?

 

Work in American Prisons: Joint Ventures with the Private Sector https://docviewer.yandex.ru/?lang=e...sign=987faa1010eb7b7f5d52c1ccca0ed615&keyno=0

 

Yes, the American Gulag far surpasses in size the Gulag Archipelago about which Solzhenitsyn wrote in Russia.

The Land of the Free and Home of the Brave are really just slogans for propaganda efforts.

Probably the largest single factor in our obscene prison situation is the drug war and its mandatory minimum sentences.

 

And given the rate at which convictions are overturned on appeal, how many innocent people are you cool with the government murdering so you can get your sociopathic kicks out of watching them die?

 

Liberal fascists destroyed the American economy, allowing the entire industry to export to southeastern Asia. And now the Chinese, Vietnamese, Malaysians ... etc. have a job, but ordinary Americans are deprived of the opportunity to earn. I call it - the genocide of the American population.
In addition, any American without charge (according to the Patriotic Act) may be in prison. And besides, the police can shoot anyone. Because the policeman thought he was in danger. This is a complete absurdity. In fact, a policeman can kill anyone. And then declare that he thought that he was in danger.

P\S:
Solzhenitsyn, this is a lying scum. In addition, his novel "The Gulag Archipelago" is declared as a science fiction novel. It is even written about at the beginning of his book. And further. Solzhenitsyn, during his life in the United States, demanded that the US government launch a nuclear strike on the USSR. That was in his Harvard speech. In other words, scum and traitor Solzhenitsyn wanted to start a nuclear war. And I don’t know why the American government favored this bastard.

 

I'm not sure that "liberal" and "fascism" can even go together. It borders on oxymoron at least.

I did not finish Solzhenitsyn's book because it was too depressing. I don't think it qualifies as science fiction, because he was there. I doubt you were.

Maybe another oxymoron....

 

If we consider “Fascism” as the superiority not of nationality, but of a socio-political group, then the combination of “Liberal Fascists” is quite appropriate. Because for modern liberals, all who do not support their ideas should be destroyed.

Solzhenitsyn was sent to prison for deserting from the front. He was a deserter. He thought it was better to serve time in prison and stay alive than to fight at the front and be able to die. To this end, he specifically wrote a letter, knowing in advance that the letters were read by counter intelligence officers, where he broke the law of wartime. At the same time, this bastard, Solzhenitsyn, summed of his comrade, to whom he sent the letter. In prison, Solzhenitsyn was an informer. He signed his report on cellmates with the pseudonym "Vetrov".
Therefore, he had the privileges - He worked as a prison librarian. All that he describes is his fantasies.
And because capitalism is now in Russia, such bastards as Solzhenitsyn are needed for the authorities, in order to rely on the bastard’s lies to assure young people that Stalin is bad. And accordingly, the ideas of equality and justice of communism are bad.

 

Interesting... and I do remember one time I was riding a commuter train in Frankfurt that I had inadvertently bought a ticket for travel during the wrong time of the day! I had bought the ticket the evening before a busy traveling day, in the evening hours. The morning of travel, train conductor (Schaffner) was having everyone in our car show our tickets, and he busted me -- for not having a ticket indicating travel at the prescribed time of the day. He told me I would have to pay him 40 Deutsche Marks as a penalty -- and he held his hand out to me, right on the spot!

That's not quite the same thing as attempting to rape German women in the very shadow of the Cologne Cathedral (Kölner Dom), and it would never have occurred to me to go participate in violent, disruptive crimes such as those that were so bad in Garmisch-Partenkirchen that the local government was begging the Bavarian State Government to send reinforcements to maintain order. Both of those things happened in German in the past couple of years, thanks to Kanzlerin Merkel's Muslim "imports"....

Still, there is a foundation to 'Law and Order' (Recht und Gesetz), and if that foundation gets cracked, it's much easier for the whole structure to be undermined....

 

What people who commit violent crimes aren't incarcerated already?

We already imprison a rather ridiculously high per-capita number of our citizens. But I certainly do agree to an extent where drug use and its consequences are concerned, although I feel that many drugs are too dangerous not to be controlled. If drugs like heroin and cocaine were to be decriminalized, something else would need to be introduced to continue to combat their distribution and use. We must recognize that many people are vulnerable to substance abuse and consider that a functioning, caring society takes steps to protect its most vulnerable members. Of course, this could be accomplished by means other than simple criminalization and imprisonment, and indeed probably should be, at least where the drug users are concerned. Those manufacturing/importing and distributing the stuff, however, are another matter. They support organized crime and are likely a part of it themselves, and their actions lead to great harm for a great many people, and they clearly don't let any of that stop them.

So, I can't agree with "let people make up their own minds what they want to do." It sounds good at first, as a matter of principle, but clearly there must be exceptions to this rule, because again, many are vulnerable and many others are of a criminal bent and choose to harm others for their own gain. There is also the problem that focusing only on violence that results from drugs will mean more people get hurt and killed in the end than do now, with drugs being controlled as they are.

 

I can agree with you on several good points you make, in spite of the fact that I have begun to wish we had never totally legalized sale of marijuana here in Colorado. But I had also said that we should legalize all drug use -- have I lost my mind? Perhaps....

Here's the problem with totally legalized drug use -- people don't use good common sense, and, they do go on to commit other crimes, or become bums on welfare. Worse, because so MANY people do this, the courts and legal system are awash in a "tidal wave" of these crimes and associated welfare cases, some of which are (or become) violent, and some which are not. We are "bogged down in the weeds" with all this crap, and we simply cannot afford it any more! People like me advocate Freedom (sounds great... right?) but then the frank truth is that too many people are just flat-out too STOOPID to be able to handle such 'Freedom'.

So, cut-to-the-chase, incarcerate those who commit violent crimes, and KEEP them in prison for the full sentence. Put them in cells, give them a hour per day of exercise, feed them three times a day, and the required medical care. That's IT. That's ALL. Nothing else. Make being in prison miserable as all hell and I'll bet everything I own that, suddenly, there will be a LOT fewer people who will do anything that makes them risk going into prison!

As for those who just carelessly and aimlessly drift off into 'addiction'... well, "too bad, so sad". Now I sound like the guy who advocates Freedom again -- and I do, so long as people don't commit violent crimes! We have to draw a line of 'involvement' somewhere, and that 'line' should be one that protects the stability of our society. If people want to throw their lives away on drugs NON-VIOLENTLY, then we should let them. But the only thing we should spend MONEY on with regard to drugs is building enough prisons for those who commit violent crimes related to drugs.

 

I'm not advocating outright cruelty to prisoners, but just generally making prison much less comfortable, with far fewer "fun", entertaining things. Sheer, monotonous, seemingly-endless boredom is one of the more dreadful things we can experience, and if it goes on, week after week, month after month, year after year, surely it would be a big deterrent to even the most hard-core criminal. But, if not, better to keep such a criminal where he cannot commit violence in society. I know it's 'painting' with an overly-broad 'brush', but we have to make decisions instead of debating this endlessly, coming up with no workable solution.

 

You could force them to follow a education in prison even if they already have a skill or profession before.
Have them learn skills so they can find a job after they get out
Or become self employed and are needed for society. Like plumbers or electrician isnt exactly that expensive to organise
Besides wouldnt be a bad thing if some highly educated guy learns how hard those kind of jobs can be to

People that find a job and have a future are less likely to return to crime after in the end.

 

logical when you consider what the reasons are for most getting into crime...lack of a job that pays a living wage...there will always be criminals but how many fewer would there be if those merely trying eat and pay the rent had an opportunity to break out of that cycle of poverty and crime...

 

I served 7 years for my stupidity when I was younger. In multiple institutions I never saw this occur. The only time I worked outside the prison was on a public works crew. We cut grass on county and city properties. We were used as on the spot grunt labor, twice. Once to move furniture inside a sheriffs office and once to tote county records to a shredder truck. It may happen, in a few isolated incidents. Certainly not on a large scale.

 

Everything is changing. The attitude of the state towards prisoners is also changing. Lenin wrote: "The state is a dictatorship of the ruling class in the interests of the ruling class". This expression is true in any government. For example, during the reign of Stalin in the USSR, the ruling class was the proletariat, in other words - the working people. Consequently, the state conducted a dictatorship in the interests of the working people. Now in the USA, the ruling class is oligarchs. Consequently, the state is pursuing a dictatorship in the interests of the oligarchs. It is obvious that the use of almost free slave labor of prisoners is beneficial to corporations, trusts, industrial syndicates. Therefore, there is the use of slave labor of prisoners. There is nothing unexpected or surprising in this.

 

Well, it was over ten years ago, I was released. Lots of time for things to change. I live in a small town with several prisons in the county. They have all gone private. Guards in uniform are often seen and now all uniforms have changed and are no longer state D.O.C.

Where the hell is the ACLU or inmate advocate groups on this issue?

 

This is libel. Solzhenitsyn was an officer still on duty in the military when he was arrested for the letters he wrote, in which he expressed his doubts about the wisdom of the government and his superiors. He went through a great deal of torture and abuse before being sent off to the Gulag. The only reason the Gulag had as few prisoners as it did is because most people didn't survive long enough to get there, or died shortly after arriving in Siberia. The Communist Soviet Union is one of the worst regimes to have ever existed, Stalin one of the most murderous dictators of all time, and nothing anyone says about it or him is worse than what actually happened, so shut up.