Did this really just happen?

[_Res Ipsa]

Well, to be clear, I am not one who thinks we don't need police. I do agree in principle that we need to narrow their focus and assign many of the tasks we ask them to do to other agencies. That makes perfect sense to me. Catching actual criminals should be their only focus, not roughing up innocent protesters or other extracurricular activities.

When the self-proclaimed freest nation the world has the second highest rate of incarceration, it shouldn’t be hard to see that we’re doing things wrong. And a mature, confident nation should have no trouble saying “what we’re doing isn’t working. Let’s look at countries that are doing better and try something else.

[_Gunnar]

If you have to say “we really mean” twice, you’re doing it wrong.

Wow! I should have seen this post before I posted my last comments. It made my last comments totally superfluous!

[_Gunnar]

Well, to be clear, I am not one who thinks we don't need police. I do agree in principle that we need to narrow their focus and assign many of the tasks we ask them to do to other agencies. That makes perfect sense to me. Catching actual criminals should be their only focus, not roughing up innocent protesters or other extracurricular activities.

When the self-proclaimed freest nation the world has the second highest rate of incarceration, it shouldn’t be hard to see that we’re doing things wrong. And a mature, confident nation should have no trouble saying “what we’re doing isn’t working. Let’s look at countries that are doing better and try something else.

As long as we have a leader who is constitutionally incapable of admitting that he could possibly be mistaken about anything or that any expert advisors could possibly know more than he does about anything, no matter what, this is not going to happen.

[_Res Ipsa]

Sarcastic or otherwise, I have heard defund used to describe contradictory things by multiple people to the point it doesn't seem clear it means the same thing to enough people to have meaning. Cops aren't kneeling on my neck. But that doesn't mean it is not my concern.

Hey, you get to be concerned about whatever you want to be concerned about. Thinking only for myself, when I see black folks finally get traction on a movement to change how they are treated by police, maybe I won’t tell them what their slogan should be and trust them to get on with it.

[_Gunnar]

We should seriously study and learn what we can from Norway's criminal justice system, and this is not the first time this has been suggested on this forum.

Incarceration in Norway's criminal justice system focuses on the principle of restorative justice and rehabilitating prisoners. Correctional facilities in Norway focus on the care of the offender and making sure they can become a functioning member of society again. Norway has one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world, currently 20%,[1] with approximately 3,933 offenders in prison,[2] and one of the lowest crime rates in the world.[3] Norway's prisons are renowned for being some of the best and most humane in the world. Norway does not have the death penalty or sentence people to life imprisonment. The maximum custodial sentence is 21 years,[1] however the courts do have power to add to sentences as they see fit during sentences if they do not feel the offender has been fully rehabilitated. {emphasis added}

With a criminal justice system like Norway's and how well they provide for the needs of their prisoners, the cost of incarceration per prisoner is likely quite high, but with as low a recidivist rate, as low a crime rate and as low an incarceration rate as Norway has, I'm sure that the total cost of maintaining their prison system is much, much less than that of housing a total prison population proportionally as high as the U.S prison population, even under the most deplorable conditions!

See also: How Norway Is Teaching America To Make Its Prisons More Humane

But there’s another important statistic to take into account: The percentage of the total population each country puts behind bars. While America jails 665 of every 100,000 residents, Norway’s rate is less than a tenth of that ― just 63 of every 100,000.

These impressive figures are part of the reason that U.S. prisons and state correctional departments, from North Dakota to Oregon (and now Pennsylvania), have sent delegations to Norway to understand its success. And they’re bringing back the lessons to American prison yards, as reform of the country’s broken criminal justice system increasingly becomes a national talking point.

Of course no criminal justice reform will have much beneficial effect unless every full time job pays enough to cover all of the employee's housing needs and living expenses.

[_Jersey Girl]

What are you guys' opinions on the NAACP?

[_Chap]

[Quoting this:]

But there’s another important statistic to take into account: The percentage of the total population each country puts behind bars. While America jails 665 of every 100,000 residents, Norway’s rate is less than a tenth of that ― just 63 of every 100,000.

These impressive figures are part of the reason that U.S. prisons and state correctional departments, from North Dakota to Oregon (and now Pennsylvania), have sent delegations to Norway to understand its success. And they’re bringing back the lessons to American prison yards, as reform of the country’s broken criminal justice system increasingly becomes a national talking point.

Good for the state correctional departments in question. How do you suggest that one should deal with US's massive for-profit incarceration industry, which depends on a huge flow of prisoners from the justice system to keep it profitable? I am sure it pays a lot of money to lobbyists to argue its case in Washington.

When a while back I pointed out that a lot of US citizens' expenditure on 'health care' is siphoned off by an essentially parasitic health insurance industry. I received an indignant reply from one poster talking about the threat to 'people's jobs' as a reason to keep one's cotton-picking hands of that sector. I suppose that the tobacco and alcohol industry lobbyists use that argument too. And no doubt the 'people's jobs' argument will fuel a lot of lobbying to retain what may be the world's least 'correctional' corrections system, however much more efficient in reducing crime other ways of doing things may be.

Am I wrong about that, do you think?

[_Icarus]

White Nationalists march in Washington.... with police escort!


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Police escorted masked members of a white nationalist group on a march through Washington's National Mall on Saturday that Metropolitan Police said occurred without incident or arrests.

More than 100 members of the Patriot Front, dressed in khaki pants and caps, blue jackets and white face masks, shouted "Reclaim America!" and "Life, liberty, victory!" video of the march showed.

The Southern Poverty Law Center describes the Patriot Front as a white nationalist group that broke off from a similar organization, Vanguard America, in the aftermath of the deadly "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017.

At that rally, self-described neo Nazi James Fields drove his car into a group of counter-protesters, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer. He was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison in 2018.

U.S. President Donald Trump drew criticism from his fellow Republicans as well as Democrats for saying that "both sides" were to blame for the deadly 2017 incident.

Video of Saturday's march in Washington posted on the News2Share Facebook page showed occasional hecklers, but there appeared to be no organized counter-protest movement waiting for the Patriot Front as the group marched from the Lincoln Memorial to the U.S. Capitol grounds and later a nearby Wal-Mart parking garage.

They were accompanied by dozens of police, some on bicycles, but it was unclear whether the group had obtained a permit for the march. A spokeswoman for District of Columbia Metropolitan Police said it had no record of a permit for the march. Capitol Police and the National Park Service could not immediately be reached for comment.

The Metropolitan Police spokeswoman said that the "First Amendment demonstration was peaceful with no incidents or arrests."

https://news.yahoo.com/masked-white-nat ... soc_trk=Facebook

[Guest]

Sarcastic or otherwise, I have heard defund used to describe contradictory things by multiple people to the point it doesn't seem clear it means the same thing to enough people to have meaning. Cops aren't kneeling on my neck. But that doesn't mean it is not my concern.

Hey, you get to be concerned about whatever you want to be concerned about. Thinking only for myself, when I see black folks finally get traction on a movement to change how they are treated by police, maybe I won’t tell them what their slogan should be and trust them to get on with it.

Thing is, this issue has been one that has been looked at and has a pretty evolved body of political argument for change that I've agreed with and argued for for quite some time.

My issue with "defund the police" goes beyond symmantics to actual questions regarding what is meant and what is needed. I strongly believe what is needed in the moment is debate towards good, solid ideas. Shutting down that debate because of some threshold of grievence being required to decide who gets to have a say with a hierarchy of say based on who is the greater victim? That's one of the worst things about the political left in the US currently and why it keeps proving ineffective. It's the cult of the amateur ran by emo kids.

But yeah, it's also symmantics and branding. It has a big fat question mark in the middle of it asking what is meant by defund the police. And the people answering that question are a legion of Twitter posters with different opinions. Perhaps that's how the debate on this will occur, in a chaotic, diffused manner where officials respond differently to different voices and demands. I'm sure there's potential in this for position be movement. But I'm also pretty sure there is potential for the self-destructive, all-or-nothing radicalism and grand standing to backfire and implode support if it gets seen broadly as a radical, anarchist pipedream made up by people who repeat the mistakes of Occupy.

[_Chap]

I strongly believe what is needed in the moment is debate towards good, solid ideas.

So let's get on with that discussion now, without further distraction. Do you think that there is, in broad terms, any proportion of the current police budget that could be spent on other measures with greater effects on reducing crime than current arrangements?