Texas conservatives reject Harper's crime plan

[Kreskin]

Texas conservatives reject Harper's crime plan - Politics - CBC News

Excerpt:

"It was kinda silly, what we were doing," says Madden. Then, he discovered that drug treatment wasn't just cheaper — it cut crime much more effectively than prison.

That was the moment, he says, when he knew: "My colleagues are gonna understand this. The public is gonna understand this…The public will be safer and we will spend less money!"

His colleagues agreed. Texas just said no to the new prisons.

Instead, over the next few years, it spent a fraction of the $2 billion those prisons would have cost — about $300 million — to beef up drug treatment programs, mental health centres, probation services and community supervision for prisoners out on parole.

It worked. Costs fell and crime fell, too. Now, word of the Canadian government's crime plan is filtering down to Texas and it's getting bad reviews.

 

[mentalfloss]

 

[Retired_Can_Soldier]

Subsidized drug addiction. Your tax dollars at work.

 

[Kreskin]

Subsidized drug addiction. Your tax dollars at work.

Yes tax dollars saving more tax dollars than stuffing people in jails.

 

[petros]

Why wouldn't something seen as ****ed in Canada be seen as ****ed in America too?

 

[Retired_Can_Soldier]

Why wouldn't something seen as ****ed in Canada be seen as ****ed in America too?

I'd say the op is cherry picking his outrage.

Yes tax dollars saving more tax dollars than stuffing people in jails.

Who says you have to stuff em in jails?

How bout stuff em in rehab instead of enabling their addiction and giving the drug traffickers warm bodies to sell product to day after day after day. Your not saving money, there are serious health costs attached to this exercise in stupidity as well as policing costs as we perpetuate the demand for drugs by enabling the addicts even further.

Junk Math.

 

[petros]

I'd say the op is cherry picking his outrage.



Who says you have to stuff em in jails?

How bout stuff em in rehab instead of enabling their addiction and giving the drug traffickers warm bodies to sell product to day after day after day.

In Texas they've seen the greed and corruption of the overwhelmingly huge prisons, privatization of prison with slave labour and the lack of success of sweeping addiction under the rug.

They know how to pick cherries, oranges, grapes, melons, apples, lemons and cauliflower in TX.

 

[Kreskin]

I'd say the op is cherry picking his outrage.



Who says you have to stuff em in jails?

How bout stuff em in rehab instead of enabling their addiction and giving the drug traffickers warm bodies to sell product to day after day after day. Your not saving money, there are serious health costs attached to this exercise in stupidity as well as policing costs as we perpetuate the demand for drugs by enabling the addicts even further.

Junk Math.

isn't that what Texans did? Treat addiction rather than send everyone to mandatory prisons.

 

[WLDB]

You know you're going to far with a crime bill when Texas says its too extreme.

 

[Kreskin]

What's your argument against the op?

 

[petros]

isn't that what Texans did? Treat addiction rather than send everyone to mandatory prisons.

They had Sherriff depts planting dope on people to fill the private prsions and getting kick backs on the slave labour.

Is that what we need here to solve our problems?

 

[Retired_Can_Soldier]

In Texas they've seenthe greed and corruption of the overwhelmingly huge prisons, privatization of prison with slave labour and the lack of success of sweeping addiction under the rug.

I don't buy into the Rockefeller Law or three strikes. I just find the whole insite program to be nothing more than subsidizing drug addiction when we should be doing the hard thing and that is helping people get off drugs. In effect we are now in partnership with the drug dealers. They provide the product and we provide the injection site, medical care and the eventual return customer for the drug dealer. Can you say vicious circle.

It's a stupid idea period.

What's your argument against the op?

I've made my argument, but this info is being cherry picked. There are some pretty pissed off American officials that we are getting into this business.. Don't kid yourself.

 

[Kreskin]

This isn't about Insite as far as I know.

 

[damngrumpy]

The prison system in Texas is a mess and it leads to all kinds of abuse. For example
they have privatized a lot of it and if you do that, to be profitable the prisons have to be
full. A lot of people who don't need to be there get caught up in the system.
In the end the taxpayer still pays they just pay a private company to administer the
prison.
The whole justice system is really a two pronged approach. There are people who need
treatment to get back into society and live productive lives.
There are people who need to spend a short time in prison to get their lives straightened
out and go back into the community to live productive lives.
There are people who really need to be in mental or other facilities for their own protection
and the public's interest as well.

Then there are those who need to never see the light of day again. We need to decide
who is salvageable and who should be ware housed forever.
Locking people up automatically for any crime is a rediculous course to follow that is why we
have judges to determine what is in the best interest of society and the person being
punished. The system hasn't done its job but that does not mean they can't do their job
its just they have not. I can see chaning the method of doing things but in the end we need
justice not revenge. We need justice for the person who was the victim, and the society.
More important we must make the punishment a learning experience if the offender is a
person who can be straightened out. Yes there is a place for a jail term and for some good
old fashioned discipline. There is room also for education and trades training so the
offender can do something productive when they are released.
There are also times when people should not go to prison at all, they should receive some
punishment but not prison.
Example
Someone hsa s grow op and they are busted. All too often these people never get to trial
when the offence is fresh in the mind of evreyone. It is some times nearly two years before
they face justice. Say the person becomes a model citizen in the meantime? They find a
trade, they give up drugs and cut all ties with the old life and the old friends. They actually
straighten out their lives and become productive citizens. What good would it do to put them
in prison? I agree there is a price to be paid for the crime, but should it be prison?
Punishments should be treated as learning experiences concentrating on positive outcomes
that are good for all.
Hard drugs are a totally different matter, a meth lab is a lot different that growing say 50 to a
100 plants. I don't know if that is a big or small operation as I know little about it but it would
seem to me that is not huge compared to a warehouse full of the stuff. Hard drugs and the
sale of same should see people going to prison as I have never heard of a casual meth user.
Pot in my view is no more serious than hard liquor and yet one you get a cab home and the
other you end up in court or prison just for having the stuff.
This tough stand on crime makes no sense, if the criminals become petty criminals or pot
smokers. Murder, rape, child molestation, and serious commercial crime and millionaire
scammers I understand that but small time criminals come on does not make sense.

 

[Retired_Can_Soldier]

This isn't about Insite as far as I know.

In that case I was off the mark, because I thought that was the point of the op. My apologies.

If you note my posts you will understand that I'm not about locking addicts up, but treating them.

 

[damngrumpy]

Retired Canadian Soldier I agree with you, all too often we imprison people who
need treatment and people who need prison time walk away with time served.
There is a big difference between dealers and addicts and between pot dealers
and Cocaine dealers as well.
Society does not understand the problems they are faced with and they have no
idea how much a major prison building program would cost to deal with it. The
building is expensive the upkeep and ongoing maintenance is a lot more than
people believe.
We need to treat addicts for the drug abuse habits they endure. To get them free
of drugs would be like releasing them from prison in itself.

 

[petros]

In effect we are now in partnership with the drug dealers.

No **** Sherlock. We supply the fertilizer for A-Stan opium growers.

Have you ever looked in to how much $ Rx abuse and who is abusing and what that is costing compared to prisons or disease prevention like Insite?

 

[Omicron]

Texas conservatives reject Harper's crime plan - Politics - CBC News

Excerpt:

"It was kinda silly, what we were doing," says Madden. Then, he discovered that drug treatment wasn't just cheaper — it cut crime much more effectively than prison.

That was the moment, he says, when he knew: "My colleagues are gonna understand this. The public is gonna understand this…The public will be safer and we will spend less money!"

His colleagues agreed. Texas just said no to the new prisons.

Instead, over the next few years, it spent a fraction of the $2 billion those prisons would have cost — about $300 million — to beef up drug treatment programs, mental health centres, probation services and community supervision for prisoners out on parole.

It worked. Costs fell and crime fell, too. Now, word of the Canadian government's crime plan is filtering down to Texas and it's getting bad reviews.

Uncle Samites have an interesting way of learning.

They take it in the teeth and get it.

 

[BruSan]

Texas and it's pay-as-you-play prison system had any number of things going against it out of the gate. Various county law enforcement agencies got wise early on that the receipt they got for every prisoner they brought to the system would pay for a new 'copter or another deputy on the force.

Our prison system wouldn't have the additional burden of a burdgeoning illegal alien problem right outside their very gates either.

Strange how those Texans failed to account for the stats on how many of their inmates are of Mexican origins.

The debate of incarcerate versus rehabilitate will rage on here in Canada, but statistics or input from Texas should play no part in it whatsoever.

 

[Retired_Can_Soldier]

No **** Sherlock. We supply the fertilizer for A-Stan opium growers.

Yes that's what we do. I saw the Government and soldiers at an Opium Field photo Op the other day.:roll:

We must be in business with that serial killer in BC as well, after all he was using the roads we built to cultivate his killing spree.

Have you ever looked in to how much $ Rx abuse and who is abusing and what that is costing compared to prisons or disease prevention like Insite?

Here we go again. Read my comments on locking addicts up.

As for RX abuse vs cost of insite - completely irrelevant.

My doctor doesn't hand out Percs or valium like candy.

If your does he should have his license yanked
Besides, one does not justify the other.