U.S. prisons swell by nearly 900 inmates per week in 2004

Kansas City.com & Associated Press ^ | 4/25/2005 | SIOBHAN McDONOUGH

[Pro-Bush]

Interesting fact:

According to the Justice Policy Institute, which advocates a more lenient system of punishment, the United States has a higher rate of incarceration than any other country, followed by Britain, China, France, Japan and Nigeria.

[seacapn]

Gotta keep people safe from marijuana. Otherwise, we might lose the whole drug war.

[Pro-Bush]

You're high I take it.

[ran15]

The jails imo are turning into another huge goverment program. We have somthing like 1 million in jail for non-violent drug offenses, at 50k a year per prisoner.

And drugs are available anywhere in America, just they cost a little more because of the risks..

[taxesareforever]

We need to start funneling education dollars to prisons. Prison population is going up faster than school enrollment.

[Pro-Bush]

None of this is a newsflash. I had to take multiculturalism classes in college in the 90's.

Once in the system, always in the system!

[Pro-Bush]

Good idea! ..Oh yeah, rehabilitation went out of style long ago, didn't work for most. Statistics ya know!

[seacapn]

High? On what? There's nothing to get high on in the US, thanks to successful drug enforcement.

[ran15]

On the good side, our violent crime rate is falling.. it seems if you throw enough of the bad apples in prison and throw away the key.. you really can bring down the violence.

[Pro-Bush]

I think you had been at sea too long, illegal drugs like meth and pot are very easy to get.

[Pro-Bush]

True.

[Lancey Howard]

Yeah, if they would only stop jailing people for smoking pot.
LMAO!!!

(P.S. Don't forget your /sarcasm tag - - some people might think your serious.)

[seacapn]

Actually, I'd like to see a recent survey of exactly what these millions of people are in jail for.

[Lancey Howard]

We need to pack the prisoners in a little better. There's no reason that prisoners should have any more living space than our valiant submariners, for example.

[Pro-Bush]

...Can't do that, it would be considered "cruel and unusual punishment".

God bless our submariners!

[Exton1]

This is misleading. Marxist countries just kill you, so they have a lower prison population. Also, you have to look at the population. Japan and China are mostly homogeneous and have less crime because of it. Also, we have a higher rate of illegals who come here, that also will skew the figures. The article is also stupid. Crime is down and the Prison population is up. So what is there point?

[Pro-Bush]

Crime is down and the Prison population is up.

.....This is the point. Thanks for noticing it.

[Waco]

Wasn't the penal code "revised" in the mid-60s? (By the libs.) Crime took off after that.

[datura]

No, the WOD was started in 1972 by Nixon. Crime took off after that. Victimless crime, but once declared a crime that part no longer matters.

That was when the Fed Gov declared ownership of us all. Some accept it quite well. Even in here.

[LaBestiaNegra]

The "fact" is at best a misleading statement, neither
to be found on the mentioned website, nor confirmed by
official data.

A UN survey for 2000 yields

United States: 638
England&Wales: 123
France: 87
Japan: 48

with only a handful of the 95 responding countries having
a lower rate than Japan, and many having a higher rate than
England.

No data for China and Nigeria there i fear, link:

http://www.unodc.org/pdf/crime/seventh_survey/7pv.pdf

And for those of you who hate the UN, feel free to find
similar information from organisations you like better.