Communist Web Tuesday 2nd May 2000 9.30pm gmt California spends more on prisons than on education BY RAISA PAGES (Granma International staff writer) TWO million persons are imprisoned in the United States, and this is the world's largest figure in both absolute and relative terms, charged U.S. trade unionist Gloria de La Riva in a televised panel discussion on Sunday, April 30. This 45-year-old Californian explained that in her state the number of prisoners has gone from 26,000 in 1981 to 190,000 now. The California prison budget is larger than the budget for education. She stated that the prisons no longer use the terms "rehabilitation," but rather punishment, and she explained that in a new prison only isolation cells were built, where the prisoners do not see light or other persons. Prisoners were left like that for nine months and practically went crazy, until one day they were taken into the yard to get some "exercise." The white prisoners were separated out, and the black prisoners were left to fight with the Mexicans, who had 87 knives. The prison guards knew they had knives and put them together so they would kill one another. It's horrible, but normal in California, the U.S. trade unionist indicated, adding that nothing has been done in regard to this case, even though a judge has spoken out against that situation. De La Riva went on to say that people in the United States live in the eye of the hurricane, because although it is an apparently quiet country and there are no wars within U.S. territory, people do not know about the billions of dollars spent on genocidal wars in other countries, recent examples being Yugoslavia and Iraq. De La Riva traveled to those two places to make films which have been shown in part on... http://www.billkath.demon.co.uk/cw/californiaspends/californiaspends.html
