Report: 1 In Every 99 Americans Now Behind Bars
U.S. Spent More Than $49 Billion On Corrections In 2007NEW YORK (CBS/AP) ― Don't ask the U.S. prison system if this is indeed "the land of the free." For the first time in history, more than one in every 100 American adults is in jail or prison, according to a new report tracking the surge in inmate population. The report, released Thursday by the Pew Center on the States, said the 50 states spent more than $49 billion on corrections last year, up from less than $11 billion 20 years earlier. The rate of increase for prison costs was six times greater than for higher education spending, the report said.Using updated state-by-state data, the report said 2,319,258 adults were held in U.S. prisons or jails at the start of 2008 -- one out of every 99.1 adults, and more than any other country in the world.By contrast, in mid 2002 the ratio was 1 in 142, with the prison population surpassing 2 million for the first time.The steadily growing inmate population "is saddling cash-strapped states with soaring costs they can ill afford and failing to have a clear impact either on recidivism or overall crime," said the report. Susan Urahn, managing director of the Pew Center on the States, said budget woes are prompting officials in many states to consider new, cost-saving corrections policies that might have been shunned in the recent past for fear of appearing soft in crime. "We're seeing more and more states being creative because of tight budgets," she said in an interview. "They want to be tough on crime, they want to be a law-and-order state -- but they also want to save money, and they want to be effective." The report cited Kansas and Texas as states which have acted decisively to slow the growth of their inmate population. Their actions include greater use of community supervision for low-risk offenders and employing sanctions other than reimprisonment for ex-offenders who commit technical violations of parole and probation rules. "The new approach, born of bipartisan leadership, is allowing the two states to ensure they have enough prison beds for violent offenders while helping less dangerous lawbreakers become productive, taxpaying citizens," the report said. While many state governments have shown bipartisan interest in curbing prison growth, there also are persistent calls to proceed cautiously. "We need to be smarter," said David Muhlhausen, a criminal justice expert with the conservative Heritage Foundation. "We're not incarcerating all the people who commit serious crimes -- but we're also probably incarcerating people who don't need to be." According to the report, the inmate population increased last year in 36 states and the federal prison system.The largest percentage increase -- 12 percent -- was in Kentucky, where Gov. Steve Beshear highlighted the cost of corrections in his budget speech last month. He noted that the state's crime rate had increased only about 3 percent in the past 30 years, while the state's inmate population has increased by 600 percent. The Pew report was compiled by the Center on the State's Public Safety Performance Project, which is working directly with 13 states on developing programs to divert offenders from prison without jeopardizing public safety. "For all the money spent on corrections today, there hasn't been a clear and convincing return for public safety," said the project's director, Adam Gelb. "More and more states are beginning to rethink their reliance on prisons for lower-level offenders and finding strategies that are tough on crime without being so tough on taxpayers." The report said prison growth and higher incarceration rates do not reflect a parallel increase in crime or in the nation's overall population. Instead, it said, more people are behind bars mainly because of tough sentencing measures, such as "three-strikes" laws, that result in longer prison stays. "For some groups, the incarceration numbers are especially startling," the report said. "While one in 30 men between the ages of 20 and 34 is behind bars, for black males in that age group the figure is one in nine." The nationwide figures, as of Jan. 1, include 1,596,127 people in state and federal prisons and 723,131 in local jails -- a total 2,319,258 out of almost 230 million American adults. The report said the United States is the world's incarceration leader, far ahead of more populous China with 1.5 million people behind bars. It said the U.S. also is the leader in inmates per capita (750 per 100,000 people), ahead of Russia (628 per 100,000) and other former Soviet bloc nations which make up the rest of the Top 10.
http://wcbstv.com/national/prison.americans.prison.2.665053.html
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
I really relate to this article
So I thought I'd share it.
I CAN DO ANYTHING, SO HOW DO I CHOOSE?
WITH COUNTLESS OPTIONS AND ALL THE FREEDOM I'LL EVER NEED, COMES THE PRESSURE TO FIND THE PERFECT LIFE.
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 4:51 PM ET Oct 17, 2007
For the most part, my women friends and I were kids of upper-middle-class privilege, raised to believe that, with hard work and a little courage, the world was ours. We climbed mountains at summer camp, went to Europe on high-school class trips and took family vacations to New York City and the Grand Canyon. Our parents, like theirs before them, told their kids they could go anywhere and do anything. We took them at their word.
By the time we hit adulthood, technology and globalization had brought the world to our doorstep. Now in our mid-20s, we're unsteadily navigating a barrage of choices our mothers never had the chance to make. No one can complain about parents who started sentences with "When you're president..." But we are now discovering the difficulty of deciding just what makes us happy in a world of innumerable options.
Three years ago my friends and I barreled out of the University of Wisconsin ready to make our mark on the world. Julia headed to France to teach English. I started law school in Minneapolis. Marie and Alexis searched for work in San Francisco. Bridget started an internship in D.C. Kristina landed a job in Ireland. The list goes on. Scattering to our respective destinations, we were young enough to follow our crazy dreams but old enough to fend for ourselves in the real world. At a time when our lives were undergoing dramatic changes, so was America. Three months after receiving our diplomas, the Twin Towers came crashing down. We realized that, in more ways than one, the world was scarier and more complex than we'd ever imagined.
Since graduation, we've struggled to make our own happiness. It seems that having so many choices has sometimes overwhelmed us. In the seven years since I left home for college, I've had 13 addresses and lived in six cities. How can I stay with one person, at one job, in one city, when I have the world at my fingertips?
Moving from one place to the next, bouncing from job to job, my friends and I have experienced the world, but also gotten lost in it. There have been moments of self-doubt, frantic calls cross-country. ("I don't know a soul here!" "Do I really want to be a __?") Frustrated by studying law, I joined friends in San Francisco to waitress for a summer and contemplate whether to return to school in Minnesota. Unhappy and out of work in Portland, Molly moved to Chicago. Loni broke up with a boyfriend and packed her tiny Brooklyn apartment into a U-Haul, heading for Seattle. Others took jobs or entered grad school anywhere from Italy to L.A. Some romances and friendships succumbed to distance, career ambition or simply growing up. We all lost some sleep at one point or another, at times feeling utterly consumed by cities of thousands, even millions, knowing that even local friends were just as transient as we were.
Like so many women my age, I remain unmarried at an age when my mother already had children. She may have had the opportunity to go to college, but she was expected to marry soon after. While my friends and I still feel the pressure to marry and have children, we've gained a few postcollege years of socially accepted freedom that our mothers never had.
The years between college and marriage are in many ways far more self-defining than any others. They're filled with the simplest, yet most complex, decisions in life: choosing a city, picking a career, finding friends and a mate--in sum, building a happy and satisfying life. For me and for my group of friends, these years have been eye-opening, confusing and fabulous at the same time.
The more choices you have, the more decisions you must make--and the more you have yourself to blame if you wind up unhappy. There is a kind of perverted contentedness in certainty born of a lack of alternatives. At my age, my mother, whether she liked it or not, had fewer tough decisions to make. I don't envy the pressure she endured to follow a traditional career path and marry early. But sometimes I envy the stability she had.
Once again I've been unable to resist the lure of a new city. So, as I start my legal career in Chicago, I'm again building friendships from scratch, learning my way around a strange new place. Yes, my friends and I could have avoided the loneliness and uncertainty inherent in our journeys, and gone back to our hometowns or stayed in the college town where we had each other. But I doubt any one of us would trade our adventures for that life. I have a sense of identity and self-assurance now that I didn't have, couldn't have had, when I graduated from college. And I know someday I'll look back on this time--before I had a spouse, a home and children to care for--and be thankful for the years that just belonged to me.
URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/55960
I CAN DO ANYTHING, SO HOW DO I CHOOSE?
WITH COUNTLESS OPTIONS AND ALL THE FREEDOM I'LL EVER NEED, COMES THE PRESSURE TO FIND THE PERFECT LIFE.
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 4:51 PM ET Oct 17, 2007
For the most part, my women friends and I were kids of upper-middle-class privilege, raised to believe that, with hard work and a little courage, the world was ours. We climbed mountains at summer camp, went to Europe on high-school class trips and took family vacations to New York City and the Grand Canyon. Our parents, like theirs before them, told their kids they could go anywhere and do anything. We took them at their word.
By the time we hit adulthood, technology and globalization had brought the world to our doorstep. Now in our mid-20s, we're unsteadily navigating a barrage of choices our mothers never had the chance to make. No one can complain about parents who started sentences with "When you're president..." But we are now discovering the difficulty of deciding just what makes us happy in a world of innumerable options.
Three years ago my friends and I barreled out of the University of Wisconsin ready to make our mark on the world. Julia headed to France to teach English. I started law school in Minneapolis. Marie and Alexis searched for work in San Francisco. Bridget started an internship in D.C. Kristina landed a job in Ireland. The list goes on. Scattering to our respective destinations, we were young enough to follow our crazy dreams but old enough to fend for ourselves in the real world. At a time when our lives were undergoing dramatic changes, so was America. Three months after receiving our diplomas, the Twin Towers came crashing down. We realized that, in more ways than one, the world was scarier and more complex than we'd ever imagined.
Since graduation, we've struggled to make our own happiness. It seems that having so many choices has sometimes overwhelmed us. In the seven years since I left home for college, I've had 13 addresses and lived in six cities. How can I stay with one person, at one job, in one city, when I have the world at my fingertips?
Moving from one place to the next, bouncing from job to job, my friends and I have experienced the world, but also gotten lost in it. There have been moments of self-doubt, frantic calls cross-country. ("I don't know a soul here!" "Do I really want to be a __?") Frustrated by studying law, I joined friends in San Francisco to waitress for a summer and contemplate whether to return to school in Minnesota. Unhappy and out of work in Portland, Molly moved to Chicago. Loni broke up with a boyfriend and packed her tiny Brooklyn apartment into a U-Haul, heading for Seattle. Others took jobs or entered grad school anywhere from Italy to L.A. Some romances and friendships succumbed to distance, career ambition or simply growing up. We all lost some sleep at one point or another, at times feeling utterly consumed by cities of thousands, even millions, knowing that even local friends were just as transient as we were.
Like so many women my age, I remain unmarried at an age when my mother already had children. She may have had the opportunity to go to college, but she was expected to marry soon after. While my friends and I still feel the pressure to marry and have children, we've gained a few postcollege years of socially accepted freedom that our mothers never had.
The years between college and marriage are in many ways far more self-defining than any others. They're filled with the simplest, yet most complex, decisions in life: choosing a city, picking a career, finding friends and a mate--in sum, building a happy and satisfying life. For me and for my group of friends, these years have been eye-opening, confusing and fabulous at the same time.
The more choices you have, the more decisions you must make--and the more you have yourself to blame if you wind up unhappy. There is a kind of perverted contentedness in certainty born of a lack of alternatives. At my age, my mother, whether she liked it or not, had fewer tough decisions to make. I don't envy the pressure she endured to follow a traditional career path and marry early. But sometimes I envy the stability she had.
Once again I've been unable to resist the lure of a new city. So, as I start my legal career in Chicago, I'm again building friendships from scratch, learning my way around a strange new place. Yes, my friends and I could have avoided the loneliness and uncertainty inherent in our journeys, and gone back to our hometowns or stayed in the college town where we had each other. But I doubt any one of us would trade our adventures for that life. I have a sense of identity and self-assurance now that I didn't have, couldn't have had, when I graduated from college. And I know someday I'll look back on this time--before I had a spouse, a home and children to care for--and be thankful for the years that just belonged to me.
URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/55960
Monday, February 18, 2008
Biggest failure at baking EVER!
Ok, I've been trying to start baking more.....and after this story, you'll clearly see I need more practice. Yesterday, I decided to concoct my own version of an old classic: banana bread. I decided in addition to the typical add of pecans, that I would also add mini choc chips and peanut butter chips. I thought it was going to be delicious. I mean come on, bananas, chocolate, pecans and peanut butter.....yummy! Well, in my concoction, I didn't account for the extra sweetness of the chocolate and peanut butter and added too much honey, thus making it tooooo sweet.
And to top it off, I cooked it for an hour and stuck my little toothpick in to test its doneness. Well I thought it had finished baking, and THEN to my horror, when I went to dump it out, it fell completely apart and was still completely uncooked batter in the middle. DISASTER. It fell completely apart on my kitchen counter. The warm dough tasted pretty darn good, but it all went immediately into the trash.
I'll keep experimenting, but hopefully this disaster will be my last......what a terrible waste of perfectly delicious ingredients!
And to top it off, I cooked it for an hour and stuck my little toothpick in to test its doneness. Well I thought it had finished baking, and THEN to my horror, when I went to dump it out, it fell completely apart and was still completely uncooked batter in the middle. DISASTER. It fell completely apart on my kitchen counter. The warm dough tasted pretty darn good, but it all went immediately into the trash.
I'll keep experimenting, but hopefully this disaster will be my last......what a terrible waste of perfectly delicious ingredients!
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Hastening the arrival of spring
This is the time of year where the weather in Georgia can really throw you for a loop. Yesterday the high was 68 degrees with a breeze and I wore a tshirt and cropped pants to go running. And today, the high was around 40 and the wind chill was somewhere around 20. Clearly, very cold. Hurry spring, hurry!!
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Do you know who your state senator is?
so, ok, I challenge you to name your state senator. I mean, I am deeply involved in politics and it even took me a second. Mine is Doug Stoner. I am NOT a fan. and the thought of him running for president of the United States in 3.5 years is absolutely absurd. Seriously, it is comical! Well if you lived in Illinois 3.5 years ago, your state senator might have been Barack Obama. Does being a state senator (not really a tough job) and being a U.S. Senator for roughly 2 years make a person qualified? I would argue whole heartedly----no way!!! I mean, what has he managed? what tough decisions has he made with substantial life changing impact on those he represents or works for. I would strongly argue: little if any.
So what, the guy is a good speaker and ivy league educated. big deal. don't we want/need more from the 44th president of the united states than a guy that can just "talk real good" Absurd! Do I still know my country? come on, America, think. what do you value? What do you place importance on in your government? Do you value safety? security? healthcare? economic freedom? I'd love for you to think about these things as you evaluate the candidates? My candidate Mitt Romney is gone, but I am holding on wholeheartedly that he isn't gone forever, I have no doubt that he'll be back stronger than ever and ready to lead. here's hoping.....
So what, the guy is a good speaker and ivy league educated. big deal. don't we want/need more from the 44th president of the united states than a guy that can just "talk real good" Absurd! Do I still know my country? come on, America, think. what do you value? What do you place importance on in your government? Do you value safety? security? healthcare? economic freedom? I'd love for you to think about these things as you evaluate the candidates? My candidate Mitt Romney is gone, but I am holding on wholeheartedly that he isn't gone forever, I have no doubt that he'll be back stronger than ever and ready to lead. here's hoping.....
The clean green machine
I have been trying to do my part to conserve water and haven't had my car washed since May, 2007! Well today on this gorgeous sunny day, I finally caved. My car was BEGGING to be cleaned. So, I went to a place that brags about recycling all their water and now I have a very clean car. I swear it even rides better. I will continue to do my part with conservation of both water and electricity..... but I figure one car wash in 8 months is pretty good conservation. :)
Friday, February 8, 2008
I'm a blogger
I can't believe I'm actually entering the blogosphere, but here I am.....blogging..... I have slowly warmed up to the cyber world, first with a myspace page, then a flickr account and now a blog! But I really have no idea what I'm doing and it may be a sign that I have no life.
I am kind of excited about it. I have lots of random thoughts, some are meant for my personal journal, and then some I guess I want to share with my loyal readers (ha!)
I became inspired yesterday as I began reading Thomas Paine's Common Sense. It sort of occured to me that he was somewhat of the 18th century's version of a blogger. So since it worked for him, I'll give it a try. I am sure I will discuss a number of things in my blog; probably random thoughts about politics, current events, men, dating, christianity and any number of other subjects to be determined.
I am kind of excited about it. I have lots of random thoughts, some are meant for my personal journal, and then some I guess I want to share with my loyal readers (ha!)
I became inspired yesterday as I began reading Thomas Paine's Common Sense. It sort of occured to me that he was somewhat of the 18th century's version of a blogger. So since it worked for him, I'll give it a try. I am sure I will discuss a number of things in my blog; probably random thoughts about politics, current events, men, dating, christianity and any number of other subjects to be determined.
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