For some time I have been contemplating the issue of American's incarcerated in jails. My good friend and editor of the Idaho Observer Don Harkins drove me to investigate the situation whose results are devastating. It seems to me that calling ourselves the freest nation in the world is a falsification when we must admit to having the largest prison population in the world. We have more people in jail than China whose population is more than double ours, more than Russia, more than India. 77.5% of our national prison populating is incarcerated for non-violent crimes. It would seem to me that re-education would be more productive then locking these people up with violent criminals. Only 22% of our jailed inmates were convicted of violent crimes. Based on numbers form the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBP) as of 2004 we had 2,135,901 inmates 77.5% of which did not commit a violent crime. That's 1,655,332 men, over 3/4 of the total prison population.

Prisons are a growth industry. Since 1980 prison population has more than quadrupled. CT and NJ are leaders in this industry. In CT the prison population in 1980 was 68 per 100,000 of population by 2000 it had reached 403. In FL, considered about average 1980 had 208 per 100,000 by 2000 it was up to 465.per 100,000. Of all those in jail in 2000, 1,324,425 were in federal jails while 621,149 were in state institutions.

A breakdown of those in jail seems to follow the rate of crime in differing racial groups. The FBP informs that per 100,000 Caucasians represented the lowest rate which about doubles for Hispanics and then tipples for blacks.

Most distressing is the fact that we seem to be spending more and more on prisons, in fact at the present rate of growth it may be anticipated that we will be spending twice as mush on prisons as we do on higher education by 2012. The rate of growth in higher Ed from 1980 to 2000 went from $44.51 per 100,000 to $160.75 while prison expenditures went from $128.78 to $212.23.

Everyone readily understands that something is wrong with this picture. The federal bureaucracy that runs the prison system and the judiciary their willing accomplice have developed a means of not only perpetuation their bureaucracy but of ensuring it's growth into the future. Last month we had a horrific murder in Myakka City Florida, a man about 20 years old murdered his mother father, brother and grandmother by bludgeoning them to death in their sleep. When caught he readily confessed to the crime and singned a confession. The Judge immediately appointed a public defender to represent him. Clearly understanding which side of the bread was buttered the defender plead him innocent. At the very first court hearing the defendant insisted on a guilty plea the judge would not allow it. The criminal became a qualified member of the lawyers full employment plan.

In other case we are apprised of judges that in violation of law instruct juries to ignore certain facts, to base their conclusions on his instructions, and that jury nullification is not part of their allowed verdict, more full employment by state and federal bureaucrats, and a gross violation of jurisprudence.

Many people are jailed for totally false reasons. No case is more prominent that that of Martha Stewart. To send someone to jail for insider trading a practice that is functionally used by every banker, investment banker, stockbroker and financial insider is a crime in itself. What this system does is step on the little people to make examples of them so as to allow the system to use a process called selective enforcement as a means to frighten the general population in paying more taxes than required by law.

The most obviously apparent practice is in the Internal Revenue Statutes that are composed of more words than the Holy Bible. So badly written that it is impossible for any two experts to agree on any single issue in this law it can be used against citizens by selectively enforcing unknown or obscure sections of the law in order to get citizens to pay more in taxes than they actually have to. Thousands of Americans are languishing in jails because they violated some section of a law that was in fact never legally adopted. The XVI amendment was never ratified by the required number of states, the Secretary of State simply lied in his endorsement of it.

The BATF has also seen to the incarceration of thousands of Americans. Like the IRS statutes theirs are just as confusing. Worse yet many of their rules are so nonsensical that no sane person would even accept them as being legitimate. Why would the state imprison someone for making alcoholic beverages? Why indeed, because the producer has not paid the state a bounty for the act of trying to make a living. Why would a percussion rifle of the 1840's be legal if the striking hammer hits the side but illegal if it hits the center of the barrel?

To stop these runaway insane policies we must endeavourer to curtail government power and bureaucracies, to make written law clear and understandable by laypersons, to reign in the judiciary that today is staffed by a bunch of power hungry law violators, and graduate more engineers and fewer lawyers from college.

The elimination of contingency fees would also serve to reduce law suites. While tort reform is an absolute must. It appears to me that people who commit non-violent crimes do so out of one of several reasons. They are too lazy to work for income; they are insufficiently educated to earn a good living, or they are dependent upon some drug the purchses of which is greater than their ability to financially sustain its purchses. In all these cases prison is not the solution to resolve or to curtail the problem. Other incarcerations for issues like violation of tax codes, insider trading, and all the various similar charges do not require any jail time but simply a fine if appropriate. Drug offenders should be rehabilitated and then re-educated by force. Only after having learned a profession and being clean for two years should they bee allowed out of the process.

While it is important to obtain the release of over one million inmates of our prison system it is equally important to change the climate legislatively to drastically reduce the incarceration rate. If we spend money to educate those convicted of non-violent crimes in special schools rather than in prisons we would reduce the prison population, improve society, benefit by an expanded workforce, reduce costs, and improve the general welfare of all the people. This is not something that interests the bureaucracy operating our prisons. They want to perpetuate the status quo, expand the prison population, expand their role, build more prisons, and earn higher pay. It is this bureaucracy that is the greatest enemy of reforming the presently operating fiasco. The second most prevalent opponents of reform are the judiciary, and the legal profession. Trial lawyers who are the greatest contributors to political campaigns have a vested interest in perpetuation the present situation so as to ensure their longevity of occupation.

Judges on the federal bench today all earn over $ 100,000. per year, many over $120,000. does it not strike you as peculiar that individuals who work on average 5 hours a day would be paid between 3 and 5 times the annual national income average? Just today I heard our Chief Justice say on TV that judges were underpaid, give us a break please!

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