Yeah, I know, the president is a little late in making a push for prison reform. You know, he had that Great Recession to deal with and a major auto industry bailout. There was a national health care reform to enact. And he had to track down that bin-Laden guy. He was busy repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and converting the Defense of Marriage Act into a Supreme Court ruling legalizing gay marriage in all 50 states. Speaking of which, there were a couple of woman he needed to see confirmed to the Supreme Court. He had to get us out of Iraq and wind down the war in Afghanistan. He had to normalize relations with Cuba. Since the bedwetters in Congress wouldn’t let him close down Gitmo, he had to empty it of all the folks who didn’t actually do anything. There were some banks that needed to get kicked out of the Federal Student Loan program. He had to double the fuel efficiency of cars and turn solar energy into a booming industry. He had to reform the credit card industry and create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He had to completely makeover and modernize the nation’s food safety protocols and make it so the FDA could regulate tobacco. He was busy getting rid of that crack/powder cocaine disparity and crushing the corrupt for-profit college industry. And don’t make me tell you about the Lilly Ledbetter Act, how he had to produce his birth certificate, or all the times he had to go to court to protect his accomplishments.
It’s kind of telling what’s been unable to do. He got comprehensive immigration reform through the Senate with something like 18 Republican votes, but it died in the irredeemably racist House of Representatives. He couldn’t get any background checks on gun purchases even in the face of many appalling mass shootings, including the massacre of two classrooms of first grade students in Connecticut. And he is only now getting to a push for real prison reform.
We have many hard problems in this country, but none more difficult than guns and race. Compared to guns and race, Cuba and Iran were easy. Think about that for a while.
But, if I told you back in 2007 that if you helped elect Barack Obama he would accomplish all these things and that the Confederate Flag would come down all over the country, too, you would have signed up to volunteer, right?
What if I told you he would do it with no help from the Republicans who would fight him every step of the way?
Would you bet against him getting something done about our senseless system of mass incarceration?
Right on, Martin. One of the best brief summaries of the president’s accomplishments. I get so tired of listening to those who drone on about how Obama failed to deliver without any understanding of what he was up against or any appreciation of what he’s accomplished in the face of unprecedented total obstruction from the Republicans (plus a fair number of bed wetting Democrats who wouldn’t back him on things like Gitmo or the carbon tax or the public option). But everything that didn’t go perfectly was of course Obama’s fault. There should have been purple unicorns and flying ponies!
Not to mention bringing the Middle East nukes under civilized control.
There are eighteen months left in this Presidency. That is a very long time in politics and governance.
A speech before the NAACP convention is a signal, but it is not yet action. One of the key contradictions in dealing with mass incarceration is the fact that it provides large numbers of makework rural jobs. which tend to be in Republican districts. A second are the sweetheart contracts that the federal government and states have concluded with private prison corporations–contracts that require payment for a certain number of prisoners regardless of what crimes are being prosecuted. Reforming the school-to-prison-to-recidivism pipeline is conceptually very difficult because so very many parts of the system are broken from the standpoint of providing justice. (And yes, that is very much a matter of being features, not bugs.)
I’m not surprised that it has taken the public becoming aware of the issue before the President has taken it on. That seems to be his MO; wait for strong public pressure before moving on an issue.
What if I told you he would do it with no help from the bulk of the Democratic caucus in Congress and with rotating opposition from some supposedly key progressive members of Congress.
Whatever can be done by the executive departments and by execultive order likely will be done. And most likely an outline of the necessary changes to federal. state. and local laws will be identified before he leaves office. Two of his own policies, however will haunt him until he gets them fixed: continuing the “war on drugs” and continuing Arne Duncan’s hare-brained education policies.
This is a huge complicated effort with lots of vested political players; I wish him well.
Private prisons are an abomination like private armies like Blackwater/Xe.
Rural jobs is how prison building is marketed but the jobs are an illusion. For fed. prisons the requirements are high (age under 40 iirc and college degree so the young ppl eligible have usually already moved out of the area and those who have lost jobs usually ineligible), for private prisons the conditions are so demoralizing there’s high turnover and no one wants to live near the prison so region remains depressed. also, prison “work” programs take jobs away from ppl in the area so jobs either a wash or a net loss.
When the incarceration rate was quadrupled from its historic norms, it had two major impacts:
Both reduced the official unemployment rate. One of the few areas of creating jobs that politicians over the past four decades can take credit for. Would have been cheaper and socially less destructive if all those workers and prisoners had been hired to dig holes and then cover them up.
The incarceration rate graph is perfectly aligned with the deindustrialization of the US economy. Leaving behind a larger percentage of jobs that either men or women are able to perform. (And since women can be paid less…) Why Some Men Earn Less Today Than They Did 40 Years Ago
As if there’s a huge supply of “better jobs” available. (There isn’t.)
But, it’s even worse than that for men today. EmPop. Male: 1980: 77.4%; 2010: 71.2%
The 1980/2012 numbers for white males: 78.4% and 72%
Black males: 70.3% and 65%.
What’s the matter with white men (62% voted for rMoney) and the white women who believe they stand by their man (56% for rMoney). Are they nuts or stupid?
Hmm. Remember this (2008):
Stuff like this is a problem
DWS like Kaine is completely worthless to Obama’s agenda.
I hope we get a list of the donors who are dubious about the Iran deal.
I went to read the link, Booman, and made the mistake of reading the comments. Yikes! The Obama (I mean B HUSSEIN Obama) haters are in full force, foaming at the mouth and raging like a pack of mad dogs. These idiots ramp up the hate and they aren’t shy about their racism.
I’m even prouder of the President for his intentions toward revamping the prison system after reading those vile comments. I’m prouder of him and of those who represent us for making the forward steps you listed. And when I read shit like I saw in those comments, I’m fiercely proud to be one of the voters who brought Obama to the presidency.
yes indeed. on opposition to Iran agreement I think it’s important to call them warmongers. that’s what it’s about imo.
EVERYTHING this President accomplished was done with absolutely no help from the other party, and lukewarm support from his own.
thanks for listing the greatest hits of POTUS.
Sometimes I ponder what this man could have accomplished with the kind of backing FDR had.
Then I stop thinking about it, because the contrast with reality is just too fucking depressing.
Charles Tiefer, Forbes: Joint Chief’s Nominee’s Alarms about Russia Have an Unaffordable and Wasteful $1 Trillion Pricetag
I’ve mentioned the “unfortunate accidents” that seem to befall many conservative tropes and conservative players in an otherwise embattled Obama administration. Some are products of the times in which the conservatives are pushing beyond reason for Obama to fail. Some are the accumulated judgements of history, like the Confederate flag issue. And some are reality crashing through like this one.
We are still having our discussion of surveillance and secrecy thanks to Edward Snowden.
When Forbes thinks this is a problem, we might be seeing the beginning of a discussion about right-sizing our national security and taking our place in the world as something other than a bully and a braggart. That would be a welcome change. The ghost of Sir Halford Mackinder seems to be panicking the conventional wisdom in the Pentagon. Clue: Russia and China are in Eurasia. They’re not going to move.
And through it all he faced down all the Angry Black Man tropes thrown at him. Perhaps his greatest achievement of all was not slapping Jan Brewer cross-eyed when she stuck her finger in his face like she was talking to some boy.
of the few issues where there actually is bi-partisan interest. Some Tea Party types actually have embraced reducing incarceration. Including Rick Scot in Fl and Rick Perry in TX.
He actually could get something done.
I don’t find the excuses very convincing. His AG could have come up with a proposal years ago.
Slate has published a story from a Fordham guy who has uncovered a curious picture of just how the prison population got so huge and why it may prove so intractable. Link: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/2015/02/mass_incarceration_a_provocative_new_t
heory_for_why_so_many_americans_are.html
Fails to take into consideration:
This person seriously underestimates the synergistic impact of decriminalizing drugs. A job and a place to live would do far more than “drug treatment.”
We should also not overlook a responsibility to re-employ all those that maintain the prisons and jails. Many of whom would prefer a different kind of work if it were available.
I did like the proposal to have funds devolve to the counties so they can directly pay to incarcerate the people they convict. Fiscal accountability might temper their ardor to spend 50K on small fry.