Political Roundtable Part XXV

[JWizmentality]

I think it's more disingenuous to bring up the instances you bring up of parking ticket violations and those who cannot afford to pay the ridiculous over inflated hospital bills, versus stone cold killers, rapists, druggies, molesters, and others that make up the good majority of prisoners.

Do they really make up the majority of prisoners?



You're throwing a lot of stuff out there but it's clear you're not bothering to check if it's actually true. Seems to me like they make up a lot but they aren't actually the majority of the people you're talking about. Like I said, I'm not necessarily against your idea in theory based on some of the more dangerous criminals not voting. I'm not really willing to consider being for it, either, unless we have a wait to clearly separate things to make it actually worthwhile.


To be honest, I'd also love to see something designed where we have better enforcement, too. I don't love the idea of the dividing line being "incarcerated" or not. People can be incarcerated for all sorts of reasons. If someone wants to tie it to certain crimes? That might be more interesting, though I haven't given too much thought on that subject, either. I'd probably want to start by increasing the enforcement on white collar crimes and then putting in some sort vote losing scheme if you were tied to that (not incarcerated). It's probably a terrible idea (as I mentioned, I haven't thought about the details too much) would give a massive disincentive to the concept of plausible deniability if we just took people's votes away for running companies that were involved in tax evasion and other financial violations above a certain threshold, regardless of the outcome.

On the State side, yes, that pie graph clearly shows the majority as of 1,351,000 inmates, more than half (718 K) are there due to violent crimes.

Yeah, State prison is where they send violent criminals so I'd expect the majority of State Prisons to house violent criminals. You need to look at the whole, not just one part.

[daoneandonly]

Do they really make up the majority of prisoners?



You're throwing a lot of stuff out there but it's clear you're not bothering to check if it's actually true. Seems to me like they make up a lot but they aren't actually the majority of the people you're talking about. Like I said, I'm not necessarily against your idea in theory based on some of the more dangerous criminals not voting. I'm not really willing to consider being for it, either, unless we have a wait to clearly separate things to make it actually worthwhile.


To be honest, I'd also love to see something designed where we have better enforcement, too. I don't love the idea of the dividing line being "incarcerated" or not. People can be incarcerated for all sorts of reasons. If someone wants to tie it to certain crimes? That might be more interesting, though I haven't given too much thought on that subject, either. I'd probably want to start by increasing the enforcement on white collar crimes and then putting in some sort vote losing scheme if you were tied to that (not incarcerated). It's probably a terrible idea (as I mentioned, I haven't thought about the details too much) would give a massive disincentive to the concept of plausible deniability if we just took people's votes away for running companies that were involved in tax evasion and other financial violations above a certain threshold, regardless of the outcome.

On the State side, yes, that pie graph clearly shows the majority as of 1,351,000 inmates, more than half (718 K) are there due to violent crimes.

Yeah, State prison is where they send violent criminals so I'd expect the majority of State Prisons to house violent criminals. You need to look at the whole, not just one part.

I think what some may consider "controversial" or "debatable" are the chunk marked Drug. I for one consider that an absolute criminal offense, and if you factor those numbers in with what is deemed as Violent, the numbers again are close to if not exceed majority. Obviously not across the board, but still a criminal offense activity that can easily be avoided

[pancakes3]

I think you're referencing a bit too much of Orange is the New Black, the system is corrupt and flawed, but not nearly as slanted as you're making it out to be

oh but it is though. and TGW didn't begin to reference judge-buying, prosecutorial incentives to be "tough on crime" and how socioeconomics affects the quality of representation*. the US has a real incarceration problem and just a facial glance at how we compare to other countries in terms of incarcerations per capita bears that out. i hope it doesn't take another in-person interaction for you to cede ground on this debate.

*not a knock on public defenders, they're amazing lawyers.

As it relates to Bernie, sure they may not necessarily vote for him in the primaries, but I'm willing to bet a substantial amount of money that if prisoners are allowed to vote, the vast majority would vote Democrat vs Republican. Do you honestly think that's not reality or some agenda?

well:
- since the inmates vote in the districts of their last known address, not the district of the prison
- most inmates hail from urban districts that are already heavily blue districts

I would say no, it's does not appear to be much of a vote-fixing agenda. there are about a thousand ways that would be more efficient in pumping out votes than burning political capital to push through an inmate voter bill.

[daoneandonly]

I think you're referencing a bit too much of Orange is the New Black, the system is corrupt and flawed, but not nearly as slanted as you're making it out to be

oh but it is though. and TGW didn't begin to reference judge-buying, prosecutorial incentives to be "tough on crime" and how socioeconomics affects the quality of representation*. the US has a real incarceration problem and just a facial glance at how we compare to other countries in terms of incarcerations per capita bears that out. i hope it doesn't take another in-person interaction for you to cede ground on this debate.

*not a knock on public defenders, they're amazing lawyers.

As it relates to Bernie, sure they may not necessarily vote for him in the primaries, but I'm willing to bet a substantial amount of money that if prisoners are allowed to vote, the vast majority would vote Democrat vs Republican. Do you honestly think that's not reality or some agenda?

well:
- since the inmates vote in the districts of their last known address, not the district of the prison
- most inmates hail from urban districts that are already heavily blue districts

I would say no, it's does not appear to be much of a vote-fixing agenda. there are about a thousand ways that would be more efficient in pumping out votes than burning political capital to push through an inmate voter bill.

I just dont see why prisoners should be afforded the right to vote when they had no regard for the law they broke. Again, the not yet convicted is a slippery slope and I'm all ears for working on a way on improving that element. But the ones that were indeed convicted and clearly guilty, do the crime, you're own darn fault.

I just personally don't think Bernie is that bleeding heart selfless of a guy, granted I'm going by my gut, but based on what I've seen and heard from him, he doesn't strike me as a very good person at heart. I feel the same about AOC, Kamala Harris, CHuck Shumer, E. Warren, obviously Trump, etc. You can probably convince me otherwise for the likes of Biden and Obama, but those others, no, I think they are for themselves and hide behind a for the people platform.

[JWizmentality]

I think you're referencing a bit too much of Orange is the New Black, the system is corrupt and flawed, but not nearly as slanted as you're making it out to be

oh but it is though. and TGW didn't begin to reference judge-buying, prosecutorial incentives to be "tough on crime" and how socioeconomics affects the quality of representation*. the US has a real incarceration problem and just a facial glance at how we compare to other countries in terms of incarcerations per capita bears that out. i hope it doesn't take another in-person interaction for you to cede ground on this debate.

*not a knock on public defenders, they're amazing lawyers.

As it relates to Bernie, sure they may not necessarily vote for him in the primaries, but I'm willing to bet a substantial amount of money that if prisoners are allowed to vote, the vast majority would vote Democrat vs Republican. Do you honestly think that's not reality or some agenda?

well:
- since the inmates vote in the districts of their last known address, not the district of the prison
- most inmates hail from urban districts that are already heavily blue districts

I would say no, it's does not appear to be much of a vote-fixing agenda. there are about a thousand ways that would be more efficient in pumping out votes than burning political capital to push through an inmate voter bill.

I just dont see why prisoners should be afforded the right to vote when they had no regard for the law they broke. Again, the not yet convicted is a slippery slope and I'm all ears for working on a way on improving that element. But the ones that were indeed convicted and clearly guilty, do the crime, you're own darn fault.

I just personally don't think Bernie is that bleeding heart selfless of a guy, granted I'm going by my gut, but based on what I've seen and heard from him, he doesn't strike me as a very good person at heart. I feel the same about AOC, Kamala Harris, CHuck Shumer, E. Warren, obviously Trump, etc. You can probably convince me otherwise for the likes of Biden and Obama, but those others, no, I think they are for themselves and hide behind a for the people platform.

You're certainly entitled to your opinion of them but don't you see your own hypocrisy on the subject? You're incapable of viewing this topic with any nuance. Everything is black and white, you commit a crime, boom you can't vote. What, it's not black and white? Well it's a small percentage anyway. F*ck em. Then you stand on your pedestal to judge others as being fake and uncaring because they dared to bring objectivity to a complex issue? You mock liberals because of their empathy then turn on a dime to judge if someone cares or not?

[pancakes3]

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[daoneandonly]

oh but it is though. and TGW didn't begin to reference judge-buying, prosecutorial incentives to be "tough on crime" and how socioeconomics affects the quality of representation*. the US has a real incarceration problem and just a facial glance at how we compare to other countries in terms of incarcerations per capita bears that out. i hope it doesn't take another in-person interaction for you to cede ground on this debate.

*not a knock on public defenders, they're amazing lawyers.



well:
- since the inmates vote in the districts of their last known address, not the district of the prison
- most inmates hail from urban districts that are already heavily blue districts

I would say no, it's does not appear to be much of a vote-fixing agenda. there are about a thousand ways that would be more efficient in pumping out votes than burning political capital to push through an inmate voter bill.

I just dont see why prisoners should be afforded the right to vote when they had no regard for the law they broke. Again, the not yet convicted is a slippery slope and I'm all ears for working on a way on improving that element. But the ones that were indeed convicted and clearly guilty, do the crime, you're own darn fault.

I just personally don't think Bernie is that bleeding heart selfless of a guy, granted I'm going by my gut, but based on what I've seen and heard from him, he doesn't strike me as a very good person at heart. I feel the same about AOC, Kamala Harris, CHuck Shumer, E. Warren, obviously Trump, etc. You can probably convince me otherwise for the likes of Biden and Obama, but those others, no, I think they are for themselves and hide behind a for the people platform.

You're certainly entitled to your opinion of them but don't you see your own hypocrisy on the subject? You're incapable of viewing this topic with any nuance. Everything is black and white, you commit a crime, boom you can't vote. What, it's not black and white? Well it's a small percentage anyway. F*ck em. Then you stand on your pedestal to judge others as being fake and uncaring because they dared to bring objectivity to a complex issue? You mock liberals because of their empathy then turn on a dime to judge if someone cares or not?

Aren't you guys the same ones that months ago complained about the electoral college because palces like Wyoming got "too muc say" even though they pale in comparison to Cali and NY? So why does that small percentage get dismissed but the small percentage of ppl in jail are gold? How is that not hypocrisy?

[dckingsfan]

Terrific chart. Nearly two million behind bars - less than 1/2 need to be there. Let's do the math on that shall we. Costs range from 40 to 170K annually depending on the type of incarceration. Let's take a very low number that doesn't include the expense of building or maintain the prisons - say 50K per year.

So at a minimum we are pissing away 50,000,000,000 per year. And we actually know the number is much higher. And that doesn't even come close to representing the number if many of them were out earning wages. It doesn't include all law enforcement agencies running around trying to enforce the really stupid drug laws. My back of the envelope math gives me well over

200B/year.

That isn't stupid? Here we are not being able to fund higher ed, not being able to fund our teachers, not being able to fund our military, not being able to fund our pensions at the local and state level - and we want to double down on our stupid on drugs war?

Wow - just wow. We have been brainwashed by the previous group of politicians that ran on fear.

My 1/2 cent.

[Pointgod]

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Bu bu bu I thought Trump would be great for LGBTQ rights? Great jobs **** like Caitlyn Jenner

[Pointgod]

Terrific chart. Nearly two million behind bars - less than 1/2 need to be there. Let's do the math on that shall we. Costs range from 40 to 170K annually depending on the type of incarceration. Let's take a very low number that doesn't include the expense of building or maintain the prisons - say 50K per year.

So at a minimum we are pissing away 50,000,000,000 per year. And we actually know the number is much higher. And that doesn't even come close to representing the number if many of them were out earning wages. It doesn't include all law enforcement agencies running around trying to enforce the really stupid drug laws. My back of the envelope math gives me well over

200B/year.

That isn't stupid? Here we are not being able to fund higher ed, not being able to fund our teachers, not being able to fund our military, not being able to fund our pensions at the local and state level - and we want to double down on our stupid on drugs war?

Wow - just wow. We have been brainwashed by the previous group of politicians that ran on fear.

My 1/2 cent.

But I’d you didn’t lock up people needlessly how would GOP politicians funnel that money to their Republican donors?

[dckingsfan]

But I’d you didn’t lock up people needlessly how would GOP politicians funnel that money to their Republican donors?

That's the even more stupid part. It specifically eats away at what the GOP base wants.

But it is part of their platform - running on fear.

[I_Like_Dirt]

I think what some may consider "controversial" or "debatable" are the chunk marked Drug. I for one consider that an absolute criminal offense, and if you factor those numbers in with what is deemed as Violent, the numbers again are close to if not exceed majority. Obviously not across the board, but still a criminal offense activity that can easily be avoided

But therein lies another problem. Who gets to decide which crimes are worthy of jail and therefore removing the right to vote and those that aren't? Why aren't we cracking down on soliciting prosecution the same way we crack down on drug possession? Put Robert Kraft in jail and let him lose his right to vote? I'm not even saying we should or shouldn't do that. I'm just pointing out that picking and choosing which crimes require "jail" is a subjective discussion and one that doesn't actually play out in public discourse very much until after the fact.

Then, you add to the fact how horribly financially destructive the system is. Dck and TGW are right about how much it costs. There is a system that spends increasing amounts of taxpayer dollars to themselves to jail an increasing number of people. That absolutely needs to be broken before there is even any discussion of voting or not voting. Thought he argument for maintaining voting rights is that it really shouldn't be a lot of people and the entire point of "jail" or any justice system actually should be rehabilitation rather than vengeance. Taking away voting rights is definitely on the vengeance side of the equation. What good does vengeance do if it doesn't right any wrongs or prevent any future wrongs from happening? The idea should be that we want people to inform themselves and become active contributing members of society and voting is a part of that. Take that away and you further remove them from society and actively hurt that goal, which probably increases the chances of re-offending in the future which creates a spiral of incarcerations which means the private prison system laughs all the way to the bank at the taxpayers' expense.

[daoneandonly]

Terrific chart. Nearly two million behind bars - less than 1/2 need to be there. Let's do the math on that shall we. Costs range from 40 to 170K annually depending on the type of incarceration. Let's take a very low number that doesn't include the expense of building or maintain the prisons - say 50K per year.

So at a minimum we are pissing away 50,000,000,000 per year. And we actually know the number is much higher. And that doesn't even come close to representing the number if many of them were out earning wages. It doesn't include all law enforcement agencies running around trying to enforce the really stupid drug laws. My back of the envelope math gives me well over

200B/year.

That isn't stupid? Here we are not being able to fund higher ed, not being able to fund our teachers, not being able to fund our military, not being able to fund our pensions at the local and state level - and we want to double down on our stupid on drugs war?

Wow - just wow. We have been brainwashed by the previous group of politicians that ran on fear.

My 1/2 cent.

Who are the more than half that dont need to be in jail? Are you talking about the not yet convicted group? Again, what's the solution then to ensure they dont just flee and potentially never face a trail?

And I can agree with your points about military, pensions, etc, but not teachers. Sorry for a position where you get 2+ months off, several days off during the year, and off when there's even a smidgen of snow on the ground, I think teachers are paid fairly. Now if you want to talk police, firefighters, etc, definite conversation to be had.

[Pointgod]

But I’d you didn’t lock up people needlessly how would GOP politicians funnel that money to their Republican donors?

That's the even more stupid part. It specifically eats away at what the GOP base wants.

But it is part of their platform - running on fear.

I’d say my thoughts about the GOP base and voters in general but I don’t want to get a warming from the mods. Let’s just say that the GOP has managed to find the perfect marks for their grift.

[dckingsfan]

Of the 2.3+M that are confined we have 300+K that are "drug offenses", 400K+ minor crimes, 400+K not convicted - anyway you cut it is 100s of Billions of dollars wasted annually.

This is incredibly stupid. There is not wiggle room here... there is no nibbling around the edges - it is just stupid. If we took care of our stupid on crime and stupid on drug problem we wouldn't have a deficit or unfunded liability problem.

[gtn130]

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Steel workers in Ohio were begging for this I bet

[closg00]

Old news, but worth consideration again considering Russian involvement. Discrepancies between exit polls and votes cast in NC, PA, FL, & WI, ALL favored Donald Trump, look at the data in the article.

The ‘Red Shift’ Phenomenon

Jonathan Simon, a researcher who has been studying exit poll data for 15 years and authored the book Code Red: Computerized Election Theft and the New American Century, says that his research has uncovered a pattern he has termed “red shift,” the tendency for exit polls to show lower results for “red,” or Republican, candidates compared to final vote totals.


“Election fraud has been occurring via the targeting and manipulation of computerized voting equipment across America,” Simon says in the publicity materials for his book.

https://heavy.com/news/2016/11/2016-exit-polls-did-hillaty-clinton-win-presidential-election-voter-fraud-donald-trump-lose-rigged/

[Wizardspride]

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[pancakes3]

Mueller's such a cuck. Did just enough to cover his arse w plausible diligence. At some point the finger of blame needs to be shifted to him for authoring such a non-committal report

[Pointgod]

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Wait all this is Mueller still wasn’t willing to charge Trump with obstruction of justice? Lol okay dude. Good job picking some pointless DOJ policy over the country.