Incarceration Stat

I read an article today that said as of Jan. 1 the U.S. incarcerated more of its citizens -- numerically and percentage-wise -- than any other nation on earth. Even China has a lower number of prisoners than we do, and since they have many times the number of citizens as the U.S. their percentage must be well below ours. Desite our attempt for generations to dislike the Chinese because they are a communist nation, and thus bad, they outshine us on this one. One of the guesses at the reason for the U.S.'s high rate of incarceration was because of things like the 'three strikes' ruling.

It probably doesn't need to be said, but locking up criminals hasn't decreased crime. If the system isn't working why isn't it being changed? In fact, rather than changing it, the system continues to build. Prison management is now privatized and hefty profits are being realized. Upwards of ten percent of some states' discretionary dollars goes to corrections. Those districts that pull in government dollars with their prisons aren't about to vote for anything that decreases prison populations.

My guess as to the reason is different. One of the traits of a fascist state is a focus on crime and punishment. It seems natural with the paranoia that seems to permeate such movements. The definition of 'justice' moves more toward vengeance. Every democracy that has morphed into dictatorship has followed a standard blueprint, and one of the practices has been to create an 'enemy within' the nation's population. Stalin, Mussolini, and Hitler all did it. Initially criminals are those who break existing laws, and punishment gets stronger. Then laws are set up that decrease the freedoms of the population and allow the rulers more sway, then political criminals start getting rounded up.

By the way, how do they know who to round up so quickly? Each of the dictators named, and many others, have already developed a list so that when they gain enough power they are able to arrest their detractors without any credible threat of public backlash. Is the U.S. government developing such a list? You betcha. I'll bet this summer, when I try to get on an airplane for the first time since before 9-11, that I will be detained because of this blog site. They have a list. I can't know if I'm on it until I try to board an airplane. It's secret. They don't have to provide any rationale for placing people's names on it. Are there political prisoners in the U.S.? Well, there were those peaceful protesters in NY during the Republican convention in '04 who were arrested and herded into a warehouse on a pier...there are prisoners in U.S. detention facilities who have been held for years without charges because the president calls them enemy combatants without having to provide proof...

Anyway, once the government is rounding people up with impunity they then resort to torture of prisoners. The Bush administration has been arguing for several years for the right to torture prisoners, and we have intelligence that our nation has secret detention facilities. We know the rest from accounts of Nazi concentration camps.

In short, the statistic of our prison population and a punitive brand of justice fits easily into the model of an advancing fascist state.

I am grateful that our nation is still free enough that I can read and listen to critiques of those in power. I am concerned that the morph toward fascism has been progressing despite the efforts of those trying to speak out. It will be a marker for me if our elections in November turn out to be questionable (again), or even more if Bush suspends the elections because we are at war or because he got a directive secretly passed that he can take control without public consent if he determines a disaster has occurred. A disaster can be created; remember the WTC? Should any of these things happen we will have crossed a line away from democracy.

I've said it before: I'd hate to see the United States lose its democracy and descend into a dictatorship when so many people tried to sound a warning and it went unheeded.

Would it be paranoia to ask someone to print out a copy of this blog immediately upon receiving it, just to prove it was there?