The boogeyman is everywhere
by digby
So we're back to this bullshit:
This early release program has been controversial from the beginning and was an issue in Quinn's 2010 primary as well. The problem is that the only answer to this alleged problem is to keep people in jail forever, something which I have little doubt the average Fox viewer is perfectly ok with. But even such liberal softies as Grover Norquist and John Beohner have been questioning this logic recently. This piece by Mother Jones from last spring discusses the new conservative prison reform movement:
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has vowed to end "the failed war on drugs that believes that incarceration is the cure of every ill caused by drug abuse." Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) says the court system "disproportionately punishes the black community" and insists on repealing mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes. Others who have spoken in favor of less draconian criminal policies include former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, former National Rifle Association President David Keene, former Attorney General Edwin Meese, former DEA head Asa Hutchinson, and Americans for Tax Reform founder Grover Norquist.
The roots of this shift can be traced to a mild-mannered Texas attorney named Marc Levin, who has become one of the nation's leading advocates of conservative criminal-justice reform. Levin saw the light in 2005 when a board member of the free-market-oriented Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF), where he worked, told him, "We're not getting a good return for our money out of our prisons." Looking at the state's prison buildup under governors Ann Richards and George W. Bush, Levin drew the same conclusion. "Once you reach a certain rate of incarceration, you start to have diminishing returns because you aren't just putting dangerous people in prisons anymore," he says. "You are putting in nonviolent offenders. You are not really impacting crime. You are not making people safer."
For a fiscal conservative, this was a compelling argument for change. "How is it 'conservative' to spend vast amounts of taxpayer money on a strategy without asking whether it is providing taxpayers with the best public safety return on their investment?" Levin asks. Rather than spend a fortune keeping low-risk offenders in prison, Levin proposed that the same money could be used for cheaper programs that would still keep violent criminals locked away and the public safe.
The murderer whom Pat Quinn is accused of letting out of jail early to maraud through the neighborhood to kill good people was released four months early from his prison term on a cocaine charge. I'm sure you can see the little problem here.
I am going to assume that conservatives will back off their "prison reform" ideas the minute they need something to hit a liberal over the head with and get the rubes riled up about violent criminals/terrorists rampaging through the streets because Democrats are a bunch of weak-kneed cowards. It's how they roll. I hope that the window isn't already closing on the possibility of bipartisan prison reform. It's desperately needed. But this ad (and the general zeitgeist) isn't a good sign.
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