It never occurs to them that they may be using the wrong instrument. The government can lock up criminals and keep them off the street. Some criminals have undoubtedly changed their ways, just as some alcoholics have given up the bottle and made something out of their lives. But seldom was government the reason. Families, churches, self-respect and all sorts of other influences have turned some people around.
Government is the wooden spoon.
This kind of reasoning would get you a failing grade in Logic 1. But it goes over big in politics. There were private colleges and universities in this country for more than a century before the first state university was founded. Before the Civil War, most of the schools for blacks were private. It was 1916 before there were as many black youngsters going to public high schools as were going to private high schools.