The US imposes the longest sentences in the industrial world, locking non-violent offenders into the prisons with the worst conditions that provide the least treatment. The offender is violated, hardened, and then released into a society with hope cut off. Not surprisingly, recidivism rates are staggeringly high. It is an expression of a foolish and failed war on drugs. Even the nations' unbending drug czar, General Barry McCaffrey has become an outspoken advocate for alternatives to jail for nonviolent drug offenders.
Treatment works better and costs less.
The teeming jails are also an expression of an abiding racial divide in this country. African Americans and Latinos make up a disproportionate number of prisoners. Almost one-half of the young African American males in the nation's capital are in prison, on probation or parole. Locked up for non-violent offenses, blacks are disenfranchised, separated from their families, shorn of their jobs and hopes. Cowardly politicians play on people's fears and hatreds and perpetuate the crime of punishment.