Still, Florida Governor Jeb Bush wants to limit these appeals to five years. Even if the convict manages to serve out his term, and stay out once out, in many states he cannot vote. In some neighborhoods, disenfranchisement levels approach that during apartheid South Africa. Those neighborhoods worst affected are poor and black. As we have learned during the ChoicePoint debacle in Florida, casting a wide net to trap these would-be voters produces incidental kill of qualified voters who are denied their voting rights due to surface similarities.
Hope comes from a strange quarter.
George W. Bush may be able to rationalize drug sentencing. Right now, punishment for crack exceeds cocaine, even though it is the same substance. Crack is the black drug of choice, cocaine the white. Bush, as our nation's Lord High Executioner, doesn't have to worry about being labeled soft on crime. The work of the Innocence Project, though affecting small numbers, has highlighted the wrongly incarcerated.