United States Prison Population, Heatherwood Apartments Mill Creek

United States Prison Population, Heatherwood Apartments Mill Creek
By Andy Alt / Political Dimensions

Oct 6, 2008 – Why does the United States have the highest prison population in the world? What causes crime?

You see, every once in a while I like to ask easy questions that I know have no chance for controversy.

Okay, hands up — how many people out there have been treated unfairly at work, when paying bills, when buying a home or renting? Any happy campers out there?

Work hard at a job, and get underpaid or laid off. Injure yourself, hopefully you can prove in a court of law (after you’ve hired a lawyer which you can’t pay for because you’ve been fired or injured from a job) that the injury was work-related or the termination of employment wasn’t due to some type of discrimination.

How do people feel positive about their lives when they feel helpless. How do you prevent people from becoming frustrated or overly-stressed when they “play by the rules” but have little or nothing to show for their hard work and honesty? How do you convince people of the “American Dream” when there is corruption in their places of employment, their banks, and in all levels of government? How do people maintain hope in these situations, and feel compelled to work hard simultaneously believing that success will come to those who have earned it?

Do people feel justice works for them when they don’t have lawyers who can beat up someone else’s more powerful lawyers?

Capitalism without conscience and an economy based on greed is un-American and unpatriotic. It violates human rights throughout the world, and degrades and humiliates the lives of people it affects. It causes unstable governments and regime changes. It’s a bad idea for everyone, not just the victims, but also the people who hold the wealth, influence and power within a society. Every government falls — it’s a historical fact. There has never throughout world history been an exception. Let’s learn from history. Let’s not be short-sighted.

As for “criminals,” who wants to defend them? Certainly not I. But the unfortunate fact in this matter is that it’s well-known that innocent people are sometimes imprisoned, sometimes merely because they are poor, out-classed, and out-gunned in a court of law. Now let’s be solution-oriented here:

1. Is there anything more we as a society could do to prevent people from believing that crime is their only option?
2. Why are the prison rates lower in other countries?
3. Can we learn anything beneficial from countries which have lower crime rates and prison populations?
4. Would initial funds and resources invested to prevent crime yield higher human and fiscal returns in the long-run?

Here are two references regarding numbers about the United States prison population. There’s a notation on the Wikipedia article about accuracy and neutrality, but anyone with more interest will no doubt do his own research.

Excerpt from Washington Post, Feb 29, 2008: New High In U.S. Prison Numbers

More than one in 100 adults in the United States is in jail or prison, an all-time high that is costing state governments nearly $50 billion a year and the federal government $5 billion more, according to a report released yesterday.

With more than 2.3 million people behind bars, the United States leads the world in both the number and percentage of residents it incarcerates, leaving far-more-populous China a distant second, according to a study by the nonpartisan Pew Center on the States.

Excerpt from Wikipedia: Incarceration in the United States

Over 7.2 million adults on probation or parole or incarcerated in jail or prison at yearend 2006. That’s about 3.2% of the U.S. adult population, or 1 in every 31 adults.

Now that I’m drunk with power and the influence a web site brings, I’m going to abuse my massive authority of the Internet to link to a friend’s web site in order to give one example of how hard-working, honest grunts are treated in our society. I realize that by taking advantage of my position I’m committing a sin, however, I’ve no doubt a similar scenario has affected other people, for I’ve experienced it first-hand in my authority-abusing past:

Excerpt from Site Lies: Lifestyle Page of HeatherApts.com on Heatherwood Apartments:

If you want to better understand just how honest the managers at Heatherwood Apartments are, I challenge you to look no further than their very own site at www.HeatherApts.com. There you’ll find all kinds of half-truths, mistruths and outright lies in ways that might surprise you. If you’re too savvy to buy in to the rumors, just look at their site to assess it for yourself.

So let’s move on to the Lifestyle Page:

Enjoy a swim in your year-round pool or soak in the spa… This pool was broken 3 out of the first 4 months I lived there, and even after that it took a passionate demand in the office (two telephone calls didn’t cut it) to get my keycard to get me into it…