1 Knight-ridder? Do all the reporters drive black Pontiac Firebirds that talk? Sorry, couldn't help myself, and yes I know it's spelled and probably pronounced differently. I hate to break this to you, but they aren't even orriginal. This was a big push in Illinois about 10 years ago, I was still in college... getting a law degree... when this came up. The logic behind it is flawed. You'd be surprised how much crime this would NOT reduce.

2 Nice one. And you know, I'm pretty sure the purpose of this proposal has NOTHING to do with reducing crime. The Observer and related minds honestly do not believe in punishment or crime. They think that if people are just nice to one another that there wouldn't BE any crime at all. I'd even be willing to bet that you could find some there that actually believe one of the reasons people commit crimes is because they were jailed.

3 You would be amazed how many people in the US believe that being in jail makes you commit further crimes. My favorite thing is that society made them that way but not the persons disipline or lack-of as a child, among other things. Maybe the person is just a mean person you never know. People who think jails are wrong believe in the Utopia dream set forth from Sci-Fi writers.

4 I'm working on writing up a post about the actual source of crime. And yes, a very large number of supposedly intelligence people believe it is external and NEVER the result of a personal choice. And funny you should mention sci-fi utopia, I just watched an episode of Charmed that featured just that...and it was as flawed as every version of utopia ever dreamed up.

5 I remember when there was a very verbal argument going around that people convicted for the first time of nonviolent, white collar infractions or small time crimes like shoplifting, when in prison, are transformed, by their continuous exposure to career felons, into walking crime machines, etc. I've always maintained that this is a lot of malarkey. The fact that they have been convicted of whatever put them in the slammer to begin with indicates that they are already intentional lawbreakers, to whatever degree that might be, and if they learn a small amount of tradecraft while serving their sentences, then use it after getting out, it doesn't change the fact that they were criminals to begin with. Unsurprisingly enough, here in San Francisco, there is a prevalence of such thought. The previous DA, a piece of(take your pick) named Hallinan, was so reluctant to put crooks in jail that cops I know referred to him by the nickname "the public defender." The jails here have been overcrowded for some time, and at one point there was a big issue of prisoners successfully suing the city and county for the overcrowding. The official response seems to have been to cut more offenders loose. The obvious solution of building more incarceration facilities would not even be considered because land here is so expensive and developers are more of a meal ticket to officials of the city and county of San Francisco than are the common people who pay, via taxes, to be protected. Coming full circle, the local left(most of the population) doesn't seem to have a problem with that arrangement as it's more important, to them, that we nurture and endeavor to understand our beloved, hard-done-to criminals, yadayadayada.

6 It's like the mindset that honestly hates America and capitalism -- it makes no logical sense and absolutely cannot be understood.