Federal prison overhaul plan

[eyeball]

In a sense, you're correct. I should have added the ongoing difficulties with Canada's aboriginal community.

I've never seen any information, study or evidence to support that conclusion. Certainly drugs are heavily involved, but my understanding is that the harder drugs are responsible for most of the crime.

Yes but as we know from all the honest debate that pot is responsible for the harder drugs, except alcohol which is not really a drug at all.

[Jerry J. Fortin]

Yes but as we know from all the honest debate that pot is responsible for the harder drugs, except alcohol which is not really a drug at all.

Only a fool would believe those cooked up numbers and stats. The reality is that drugs and prostitution have been around forever, and there is simply no way to stop it or prevent it. As it stands it is out of control and as such provides the means of the illegal activities that cause harm to many citizens through the direct or indirect impact of those activities. The thing to do is bring it into control, regulate and license the activities to reduce the adverse impact to the public. That is supposed to be one of the functions of government to legislate protective measures for society. So we have an ages old problem that the government refuses to address and the public does diddly squat about it. It is a shame.

[eyeball]

So we have an ages old problem that the government refuses to address and the public does diddly squat about it. It is a shame.

But the government is addressing it with cooked up numbers and stats, fear, loathing and a harsher criminal code.

Only a fool would believe those cooked up numbers and stats.

According to some numbers and stats a 'majority' of the public is buying it and are swinging towards the Conservatives.

[Wilber]

BC bud fuels the munchies, not terrorism. Its simply foolish to believe otherwise.

Consumption does but the revenue it generates fuels all kinds of things its customers would just as soon ignore.

[Wilber]

You don't need to convince me, legalize, tax, and control it. Combine that with taking it out of the true criminals hands,(big commercial growers), and it's a no brainer, imo.

I tend to agree in principle but when over 70% of it is for export to places where it is still illegal, legalizing it will do nothing to eliminate organized crime from the picture. It will still be far too lucrative. Anyone who thinks otherwise is deceiving themselves.

[eyeball]

I tend to agree in principle but when over 70% of it is for export to places where it is still illegal, legalizing it will do nothing to eliminate organized crime from the picture. It will still be far too lucrative. Anyone who thinks otherwise is deceiving themselves.

So what? Its up to the countries that insist on keeping it illegal to deal with their issues at their border. The cost of slowing down the flow of trade with the US is not worth the ongoing erosion of our civil liberties or our principles.

Crime is going down and we are becoming a less violent society but we are planning on increasing the size of our police force(s), the powers of the state, and the numbers of people these can arrest and incarcerate. We are doing this strictly for ideological and economic reasons that have little if anything to do with science, statistics or principles. Anyone who believes otherwise has been succesfully decieved.

[Sabre Rider]

This is exactly why Harper needs to win!!

It s time to get tough on crime and criminals...prison isn t supposed

to be a country club, it is to get low life off the streets and protect law

biding citizens!! The whiny Liberal human rights nonsense is getting old!

Harper is going to make major changes when he gets his majority..and

i say thank God!

To quote Pink Floyd:

Waiting to cut out the deadwood

Waiting to clean up the city

Waiting to follow the worms

Waiting to put on a black shirt

Waiting to weed out the weaklings

Waiting to smash in their windows

And kick in their doors

Waiting for the final solution

To strengthen the strain

Waiting to follow the worms

Waiting to turn on the showers v And fire the ovens

Waiting for the queers and the coons

And the reds and the Jews

Waiting to follow the worms

Did they leave anybody out?

[Sabre Rider]

One bullet per hardened, repeat, violent offender is cheaper.

Actually, a bullet behind the ear is THE most effective way to deal with crime. It solves the issue of recidivism of violent offenders, and will scare the others straight.

Again, a bullet to the head cures the problem of prison violence and rioting.

So, is anyone actually looking for the most effective method of dealing with crime? Or are they simply looking for the system that is most palatable to them? There is no cost too great when it comes to protecting children from violent predators (unless you would like to disagree with that statement), so the cost of prisons and extended incarceration should not bother anyone.

Of course, a bullet is still cheaper.

I take you are all in favour of the old Soviet Penal System as it actions mirror your wishes. Funny how said system never wiped out crime.

[Wilber]

So what? Its up to the countries that insist on keeping it illegal to deal with their issues at their border. The cost of slowing down the flow of trade with the US is not worth the ongoing erosion of our civil liberties or our principles.

Crime is going down and we are becoming a less violent society but we are planning on increasing the size of our police force(s), the powers of the state, and the numbers of people these can arrest and incarcerate. We are doing this strictly for ideological and economic reasons that have little if anything to do with science, statistics or principles. Anyone who believes otherwise has been succesfully decieved.

I guess your livelihood doesn't depend on the flow of trade. Or maybe you just think it doesn't. Perhaps if we could just incarcerate those who have commited fifty or more offences we might start getting somewhere. People like to go on about the cost of keeping these folks in jail but those same people don't seem to consider the cost to society of letting multiple offenders stay on the street. If allowing these people to continually victimize others is an idiology, it's a shitty idiology with lousy principles.

[ToadBrother]

I wouldn't mind trying legalized prostitution. Actually, technically, it already is lega. It's communicating for the purposes of prostitution which is illegal, along with having any kind of shelter for the activity. It's utterly ridiculous to me that the police will zealously go after a "house of ill repute" so that the girls have to instead ply their trade on street corners and in alleys.

I agree. Pretty much all the most heinous acts against prostitutes have happened since the advent of "streetwalking". Jack the Ripper was the start, and those poor women were as much the victims of ludicrous Victorian "sensibilities" as they were of that maniac, and ever since then prostitutes have been the targets of these kinds of monsters.

I also wouldn't mind legalizing pot, insofar as we can get away with it without unduly freaking out our puritan neighbours (and major trading partner and main source of tourism). Maybe if we just made it a big fine for being caught in posession... dunno.

I think there's growing pressure within the US to start being reasonable on pot.

[ToadBrother]

I tend to agree in principle but when over 70% of it is for export to places where it is still illegal, legalizing it will do nothing to eliminate organized crime from the picture. It will still be far too lucrative. Anyone who thinks otherwise is deceiving themselves.

It certainly worked for alcohol. You don't exactly see a lot of rum-runners around any more, and the mobsters just found other prohibited vices, like prostitution, gambling and narcotics.

If we legalized drugs, the artificial economic scarcity that is produced by keeping the product illegal, would disappear. The precisely same thing happened during Prohibition; once you banned liquor, it became scarce, and thus much more valuable, and this encouraged bootlegging, which of course quickly got taken over by organized crime, made them all rich, got them into big turf wars which in general caused the surrounding society to suffer as the extent of the activities grew. The more police and other investigators you put out, the more valuable the liquor got, and the more violent the competition became. Then Prohibition ended. Liquor could be bought legally, even if in many places it was still considerably more expensive than it had been before Prohibition, the artificial scarcity was eliminated, and the product no longer was of any particular interest to organized crime.

[Wilber]

I agree. Pretty much all the most heinous acts against prostitutes have happened since the advent of "streetwalking". Jack the Ripper was the start, and those poor women were as much the victims of ludicrous Victorian "sensibilities" as they were of that maniac, and ever since then prostitutes have been the targets of these kinds of monsters.

You might want to read this first.

Prostitution in the Netherlands

[Wilber]

It certainly worked for alcohol. You don't exactly see a lot of rum-runners around any more, and the mobsters just found other prohibited vices, like prostitution, gambling and narcotics.

If we legalized drugs, the artificial economic scarcity that is produced by keeping the product illegal, would disappear. The precisely same thing happened during Prohibition; once you banned liquor, it became scarce, and thus much more valuable, and this encouraged bootlegging, which of course quickly got taken over by organized crime, made them all rich, got them into big turf wars which in general caused the surrounding society to suffer as the extent of the activities grew. The more police and other investigators you put out, the more valuable the liquor got, and the more violent the competition became. Then Prohibition ended. Liquor could be bought legally, even if in many places it was still considerably more expensive than it had been before Prohibition, the artificial scarcity was eliminated, and the product no longer was of any particular interest to organized crime.

It worked for alcohol when prohibition was repealed in the US. Until then the criminal element was heavily involved in Canada, even though it was legal here.

How could you legalize something like crystal meth or crack? If a drug company produced and sold the stuff they would have their asses sued off and people would go to jail for the damage they caused. The same goes for several other street drugs. There are many therapeutic legal drugs that can't be sold for general consumption because of the damage they can cause. That is why we make them available by prescription only.

[Jerry J. Fortin]

To those that have ears let them listen!!!

Things that are out of control are only out of the control of governments. They are in the control of the private if illegal sector of the economy. Should a government make the move to make these illegal things legal, you can bet your sweet ass that organized crime would have something to say about it. That would be a clue to where the money is really going.

Nobody is asking to legalize anything but weed in the drug trade. Not crack or meth or other chemicals, that stuff is really bad for people, but not weed. There is no truth to the gateway drug line of crap.

The same applies to hookers. Nobody thinks we should legalize underage girls or pimps, just the trade workers and the means to do business. Do that and you can put more teeth in laws against sexual offenses.

[Wilber]

To those that have ears let them listen!!!

Things that are out of control are only out of the control of governments. They are in the control of the private if illegal sector of the economy. Should a government make the move to make these illegal things legal, you can bet your sweet ass that organized crime would have something to say about it. That would be a clue to where the money is really going.

Nobody is asking to legalize anything but weed in the drug trade. Not crack or meth or other chemicals, that stuff is really bad for people, but not weed. There is no truth to the gateway drug line of crap.

The same applies to hookers. Nobody thinks we should legalize underage girls or pimps, just the trade workers and the means to do business. Do that and you can put more teeth in laws against sexual offenses.

The why do I keep seeing the phrase,"if we legalized drugs". My point is you cannot remove organized crime from the equation if the primary market for its product is in a place where you have no jurisdiction. Cigarettes are legal yet there is organized crime involved in their illegal trade due to taxation.

When it comes to hookers you obviously didn't read the link on the Netherlands. They legalized prostitution years ago and it has done nothing to reduce associated crime.

From Wikipedia

When the Dutch government legalized prostitution in 2000, it was to protect the women by giving them work permits, but some fear that this business cannot be normalized.[6] Recently, officials have noticed an increase in violence centered around this irregular industry, and have blamed this increase on the illegal immigration of individuals into Amsterdam, to participate in the sex industry. Prostitution has remained connected to criminal activities, which has led the authorities to take several measures, including detailed plans to help the prostitutes quit the sex trade and find other professions. [7] In response to the problems associated with the involvement of organized crime into the sex trade, the Dutch government has decided to close numerous prostitution businesses (see below).

[edit] Reducing the size of the red light district

In the last few years the city government of Amsterdam, under Mayor Job Cohen has started cracking down on prostitution in the capital, resulting in the closure of the Yab Yum, Casa Rosso and the Banana Bar as well as buying one third of all prostitution windows at the Wallen and turning them into studios for artists and fashion designers. Concerned about money laundering and human trafficking, Amsterdam officials under mayor Job Cohen denied the license renewals of about 30 brothels in the Amsterdam red light district De Wallen in 2006; the brothel owners appealed. To counter negative news reports, the district organized an open house day in 2007 and a statue to an unknown sex worker was unveiled.[8] In September 2007 it was announced that the city of Amsterdam was buying several buildings in the red light district in order to close about a third of the windows.[9]

At the end of 2007 one-third of the Amsterdam brothels were closed.[10]

At the end of 2008, mayor Job Cohen announced plans to close half of the city’s 400 prostitution windows because of suspected criminal gang activity. The mayor is also closing some of the city’s 70 marijuana cafes and sex clubs.[11] This comes at the same time as the Government's decision to ban the sale of magic mushrooms and the closure of all coffee shops situated near schools.[3] Mayor Job Cohen: "It is not that we want to get rid of our red-light district. We want to reduce it. Things have become unbalanced and if we do not act we will never regain control."[3]

Human trafficking

The Netherlands is listed by the UNODC as a top destination for victims of human trafficking.[12] Countries that are major sources of trafficked persons include Thailand, China, Nigeria, Albania, Bulgaria, Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine.[12]

Currently, human trafficking in the Netherlands is on the rise, according to figures obtained from the National Centre against Human Trafficking. The report shows a substantial increase in the number of victims from Hungary and China. There were 809 registered victims of human trafficking in 2008, 763 were women and at least 60 percent of them were forced to work in the sex industry. All victims from Hungary were female and were forced into prostitution. [13] [14]

Within the Netherlands, victims are often trafficked by so called "lover boys" – men who seduce young women and girls and coerce them into prostitution. Women and girls are trafficked to the Netherlands from Nigeria, Bulgaria, China, Sierra Leone, and Romania, as well as other countries in Eastern Europe. [15]

Many victims of human trafficking are led to believe by organized criminals that they are being offered work in hotels or restaurants or in child care and are forced into prostitution with the threat or actual use of violence. Estimates of the number of victims vary from 1000 to 7000 on a yearly basis. Most police investigations on human trafficking concern legal sex businesses. All sectors of prostitution are well represented in these investigations, but particularly the window brothels are overrepresented. [16] [17] [18]

At the end of 2008, six people were convicted in what prosecutors said was the worst case of human trafficking ever brought to trial in the Netherlands. Experts said the case could have an impact on the Dutch prostitution policy. Jan van Dijk, an organized crime and victimology expert at the University of Tilburg, said "The honeymoon of the new prostitution legislation is over; we are really reconsidering whether we're on the right track". [19]

Perhaps we shoud get over this simplistic notion that all we need to do in order to get rid of a problem is legalize it.

[Topaz]

The Tories want to build more US-style prisons to put more people in them and this is going to cost big time. Wouldn't be cheaper to put more money into social programs and try to avoid the future generation from making the mistakes of their elders? It cost about 88,000 per year for Fed prisoner and that is probably gone up since the following stats were reported. http://www.prisonjustice.ca/politics/facts_stats.html

[Keepitsimple]

One of the over-riding principles of Conservatives is the transition to "earned Parole". By definition, this will eliminate Statutory Release after serving 2/3 of the sentence. Supposedly, the principle behind Statutory Release was to allow prisoners to gradually integrate with society while still under parole supervision. Opponents of elimination would have you believe that somehow, nobody will get out of prison until their sentence is completely served. Hogwash. All prisoners can earn parole and can still earn it as early as 1/3 into their sentence. Only those who show no remorse - those who refuse to participate in helpful programs - those who continue to cause trouble in prison - those are the ones who won't get out until their sentence is fully served......and those are precisely the individuals who make up the majority of recidicism - repeat offenders. Let them serve longer and longer sentences each time they flaunt justice. Seems like common sense to me.

Edited September 28, 2009 by Keepitsimple

[Wilber]

One of the over-riding principles of Conservatives is the transition to "earned Parole". By definition, this will eliminate Statutory Release after serving 2/3 of the sentence. Supposedly, the principle behind Statutory Release was to allow prisoners to gradually integrate with society while still under parole supervision. Opponents of elimination would have you believe that somehow, nobody will get out of prison until their sentence is completely served. Hogwash. All prisoners can earn parole and can still earn it as early as 1/3 into their sentence. Only those who show no remorse - those who refuse to participate in helpful programs - those who continue to cause trouble in prison - those are the ones who won't get out until their sentence is fully served......and those are precisely the individuals who make up the majority of recidicism - repeat offenders. Let them serve longer and longer sentences each time they flaunt justice. Seems like common sense to me.

Statutory release is merely an insult to victims by imposing sentences that there is no intention of being carried out. Sounds good, means nothing.

[Topaz]

Here's another idea and no that cost very little. IF you are a Canadian citizen and break Canadians laws then you should lose your citizenship and ask to leave the country. Now how many people would take a chance of losing their citizenship?

[eyeball]

Here's another idea and no that cost very little. IF you are a Canadian citizen and break Canadians laws then you should lose your citizenship and ask to leave the country. Now how many people would take a chance of losing their citizenship?

So are they supposed to go to Mars or something?

[Jerry J. Fortin]

Only a fool would believe that legislation solves all of the problems of society. The thing to keep in mind is that some things are harmful to others and those are that which the government should regulate and legislate. Lets keep in mind the purpose of elected representatives and government shall we.

[Wilber]

Here's another idea and no that cost very little. IF you are a Canadian citizen and break Canadians laws then you should lose your citizenship and ask to leave the country. Now how many people would take a chance of losing their citizenship?

Who is going to take them? All you are advocating is that someone else should have to deal with your problems.

[myata]

Only a fool would believe that legislation solves all of the problems of society. The thing to keep in mind is that some things are harmful to others and those are that which the government should regulate and legislate. Lets keep in mind the purpose of elected representatives and government shall we.

It could solve a particular government's problems though. Or the government may think so. On the society side, it's more or less 2 x 2, the societies with "tough justice" almost invariably have highest rates of crime.

[Wilber]

It could solve a particular government's problems though. Or the government may think so. On the society side, it's more or less 2 x 2, the societies with "tough justice" almost invariably have highest rates of crime.

Really. The simplistic approach again. There are many social, economic and other reasons for the crime rates in different countries. One could just as well ask, do societies have "tough justice" because they have high crime rates? Why do you assume justice is a cause of crime?

[Jerry J. Fortin]

It could solve a particular government's problems though. Or the government may think so. On the society side, it's more or less 2 x 2, the societies with "tough justice" almost invariably have highest rates of crime.

The issue here should be the containment of the perpetrators of violent crimes. The entire issue is clouded by those with agendas of moral superiority and a predisposition to forming judgments. The reality is that we are our brothers keeper, and as such do we or should we become our brothers parent? Do we take responsibility for all of the actions of our brother or do we simply ensure our brothers safety and freedom? Just what is it that people want the government to do?