Perhaps it's rooted in the Drug War, though my memory tends to conflate this mostly with the War on terrorism.
The War on Terror certainly helped push through the Patriot Act, but guess what it's mostly used on? Drugs (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/patriot-act-used-to-fight-more-drug-dealers-than-terrorists/2011/09/07/gIQAcmEBAK_blog.html).
The abuse of power stemming from the Patriot Act in that regard is the same abuse of power used before it was put into play. The Patriot Act just made it easier, and that it was fully bipartisan didn't hurt matters.
Privatized profit-motive prisons hardly have a motive to *shrink* prisoner populations, and where there are strong associations of the people who run them and say......state governors.....
Privatized prisons account for 10% of all prisons (http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/top-5-secrets-private-prison-industry-163005314.html), so it's hardly something that's driving any sort of lawmaking. There's no motivation to shrink prison populations because no one wants to be viewed as "soft on crime," not because this 10% of prisons are driving people into the cells. The expansion of laws and the trend toward criminalization of things that shouldn't be criminalized predates the growth in private prisons.
I'm not a fan of private prisons, but let's not attack them based on false ideas of what they mean.
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Date: 8/5/14 00:33 (UTC)The War on Terror certainly helped push through the Patriot Act, but guess what it's mostly used on? Drugs (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/patriot-act-used-to-fight-more-drug-dealers-than-terrorists/2011/09/07/gIQAcmEBAK_blog.html).
The abuse of power stemming from the Patriot Act in that regard is the same abuse of power used before it was put into play. The Patriot Act just made it easier, and that it was fully bipartisan didn't hurt matters.
Privatized profit-motive prisons hardly have a motive to *shrink* prisoner populations, and where there are strong associations of the people who run them and say......state governors.....
Privatized prisons account for 10% of all prisons (http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/top-5-secrets-private-prison-industry-163005314.html), so it's hardly something that's driving any sort of lawmaking. There's no motivation to shrink prison populations because no one wants to be viewed as "soft on crime," not because this 10% of prisons are driving people into the cells. The expansion of laws and the trend toward criminalization of things that shouldn't be criminalized predates the growth in private prisons.
I'm not a fan of private prisons, but let's not attack them based on false ideas of what they mean.