Conservative Skepticism About 'Tough On Crime' Policies Gets Its Turn At CPAC

[jct74]

Conservative Skepticism About 'Tough On Crime' Policies Gets Its Turn At CPAC

by Ryan J. Reilly
Posted: 03/07/2014 2:02 pm EST

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. -- In a back corner of the exhibition hall for the Conservative Political Action Conference -- past the National Rifle Association's multiple booths and across the way from the Charles Koch Institute's table -- there's a group making its first appearance at CPAC. Its table is littered with handouts featuring libertarian Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and a bowl full of yellow squirt guns, and its television flashes quotes from preacher Pat Robertson and former President George H.W. Bush.

But its call for criminal justice reform was not traditionally welcome in the conservative movement. The nonpartisan Families Against Mandatory Minimums fights against laws that force judges to send convicted criminals away for a set number of years, regardless of individual circumstances.

FAMM's message at CPAC was well targeted to the audience. The group's pamphlets highlighted the family of Orville Lee Wollard, a former Sea World employee in Florida who was sentenced to 20 years behind bars in 2009 for firing a warning shot inside his home to scare off his daughter's violent boyfriend.

"We're getting a really good reaction, especially when we talk about mandatory minimums for gun crimes," Molly Gill, FAMM's government affairs counsel and a former prosecutor, told The Huffington Post. "People identify with that, and it resonates very strongly with them because they're gun owners, and because I think a lot of them do fear that if they defended themselves or their family, there would be really harsh consequences for that."

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read more:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/07/criminal-justice-reform-cpac_n_4920352.html

[jct74]

ReasonTV covered this topic at CPAC


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=korrhPw8FEI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=korrhPw8FEI

[jct74]

Inside The Weirdly Bipartisan, Very Optimistic World Of Prison Reform

No one in Washington is happy right now — except for the conservatives and liberals pushing to change the way prisons work in America. “I’ve been working this field since 1990 and this is certainly the most hopeful time I’ve seen in that 25-year period.”

by Evan McMorris-Santoro
posted on March 9, 2014 at 11:02pm EDT

WASHINGTON — These days the most optimistic people in Washington deal with a dark topic: overhauling the nation’s criminal justice system.

The biggest reason for the optimism is, after decades of tough-on-crime politicians from both parties, the groups behind the push for new prison policies are unusually bipartisan.

Not that they’ll admit to that just yet — there’s still a lot of wariness, especially on the conservative side. But behind the caution is a real sense of movement with ideologically divergent politicians like Sens. Rand Paul and Patrick Leahy working together on legislation and groups like the conservative Right on Crime quietly taking meetings with the NAACP and ACLU on the issue of criminal justice.

“I’ve been working this field since 1990 and this is certainly the most hopeful time I’ve seen in that 25-year period,” said David Fathi, ACLU National Prison Project director. “There is an openness to fundamentally rethinking our approach to crime and deviant behavior in a way that I’ve never seen before.”

...

read more:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/evanmcsan/inside-the-weirdly-bipartisan-very-optimistic-world-of-priso

[kcchiefs6465]

Good on Rand Paul for his support of these measures.

Mandatory minimum sentences fly in the face of a person's actions being judged and an appropriate sentence handed down. A person sitting in jail a single day for drug related offenses does as well. (83% of the prison population should be released as their crimes have no victim.. much of the remaining 17% are there for property crimes and it is probable that in many instances, retribution could be offered without incarceration)

It's a booming industry and many are unwilling to change it. I imagine Paul knows this and is treading carefully with regards to the issue. It being presented in a simple, moral, manner would do the country good. Those who wish to waste other people's money incarcerating non-violent offenders are becoming the exception, not the norm.