Graydon wrote: >The US generally runs prisons as profit centres.< I don't think so. Maybe loss centers or money pits. Regards, Bob S.
On Sat, Jan 23, 2010 at 9:00 AM, Graydon <[email protected]> wrote: > On Fri, Jan 22, 2010 at 11:19:10AM -0500, David J Brooks scripsit: >> On Thu, Jan 21, 2010 at 8:12 PM, Graydon <[email protected]> wrote: >> > On Thu, Jan 21, 2010 at 01:15:54PM -0500, David J Brooks scripsit: >> >> Or, a 1 day sentence for trying to blow up parts of Toronto and cut >> >> off Harpers head. >> >> Unbeliveble >> > >> > Well, more like claiming to have made wildly grandiose plans with no >> > plausible or even implausible mechanisms for success. Time served plus >> > a day plus probation for being young and unusually stupid with no actual >> > harm done seems... appropriate, really. >> >> Sorry, but don't agree here. Free to try and bomb some other place now. >> They planned to kill a lot of people and were caught before they could., > > They thought they ought to try, is I think closer. > > Having the ability, or actively seeking the ability, to produce credible > plans to bomb some public place as a political act is a very different > thing than making lots of noise about bombs and going on about killing > the PM. If there's no evidence they know their head from their foot > it's a very different thing than if they made credible plans. > >> Lots of jail time is my thoughts. > > Ah, but that confirms they are important and dangerous. The folks who > do the actual peer-reviewed research on terrorist motivations find that > they have almost no ideological motivation and want to be taken > seriously above all else. > > Having the judge say "you're dumber than sand and couldn't reliably set > off firecrackers even if someone else bought them for you; you get a day > plus time served. In the unlikely event that you might possibly > demonstrate learning ability, we're going to have you supervised by the > probation system for the next goodly while" is not a communication of > significance; it's a communication of being, well, dumber than sand and > wasting everybody's time. > > The next guy who wants to be thought important is going to look at that > and see something that doesn't work, rather than something he can turn > into a big romantic story about how scary he is. > >> Now, if this had happened in the US, i';m 100% sure the out come would >> be a lenghty jail sentence. > > The US generally runs prisons as profit centres. This has unfortunate > side effects on a great many things. (Lots of research that the utility > of long jail sentences is negative; either you lock them up forever > because they're permanently dangerous, or you lock them up for awhile in > the hopes of teaching them something, but locking people up for twenty > years is not likely to either teach them anything good or make anybody > safe from them.) > > -- Graydon > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
