HELL—A report released Monday by the Afterlife Civil Liberties Union indicates that nine out of 10 souls currently serving in Hell were condemned on drug-related sins.

“Hell was created to keep dangerous sinners off the gold-paved streets of Heaven,” ACLU spokesman Barry Horowitz said. “But lately, it’s become a clearing-house for the non-evil souls that Heaven doesn’t know how to deal with.”

etc.

4 people were sentenced to prison sentences ranging from 2 years to 8 years for importing Honduran Lobster Tails, a non-endangered species.

The reason they were sent to prison is due to the fact they had packed a few undersized Lobster Tails in clear plastic bags instead of cardboard boxes.

They were imprisoned for violating a wildlife law in Honduras that no longer existed at the time of these business peoples alleged criminal actions!

Even though the Honduran Government testified that the law was no longer valid the courts in America including our U.S. Supreme Court ruled the sentences valid.

Keeping US Safe From Plastic-packed Lobster Tails Complexity of laws leading to “over-Criminalization” of America?

Diane Huang, a small business owner from New Jersey, is scheduled to enter federal prison on July 21, where she will begin serving a two-year sentence for purchasing undersized lobster tails shipped in clear plastic bags.

Under the Lacey Act, a U.S. law, it is illegal to take wildlife in violation of foreign law. The lobsters Ms. Huang purchased violated obscure laws of Honduras because they were shipped in clear plastic bags, rather than opaque cardboard boxes, and a small percentage of the lobsters did not measure to 5.5 inches in length.

Case ‘an abominable injustice’
Sunday, June 22, 2008

There are times when a prosecution and a prison sentence are so fishy that they cry out for clemency.

Sometime between now and Sept. 4, Honduran businessman David Henson McNab will be released after nearly eight full years in a U.S. federal prison, all because, prosecutors say, he was too selfish about shellfish.

Along with the above stated programs I also believe that states should invest in treatment facilities. More bed space is needed for treatment. The construction of these facilities will require money spent by the states and localities, another hurdle for fiscal conservatives. But it will be money spent smarter than continually building jails and prisons to warehouse individuals.

Please don’t think that I am some wussy lib who thinks everyone is innocent and the man is keeping him down. Not me. Dealers still need to be dealt with. Trafficking needs to be dealt with. Prisons are for those people. We need to lower the demand for drugs, which treatment does. Jails do not. The drug business in prisons and jails is lucrative, in some cases more so than on the street.

Another point, I have toyed with the idea of legalizing drugs. After doing what I do for a few years, there is a stark difference in drug users and non drug users, whether it be marijuana or meth. I in no way am supportive of legalizing drugs. The financial gain of taxing these substances would be meager to the ruin of social values, family values, etc. More problems would be caused I’m afraid.

Now, lowering the drinking age is a whole other story.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/28/AR2008122801728.html

Sometimes NT means “NightTwister” too though. I always see my name in lights

We think that addicts are bad. There is a difference. The person who lives on your block, is a regular drug user, holds down a job, mows his or her yard every week-most don’t have a problem with and don’t really care about the drug use.

It is when we see people who lack the self-control to recognize what is acceptable at a certain time and in a certain place-that bothers us. That is why most Americans laugh at girls showing their boobs in New Orleans but would get angry if it happened in a church.

If we hate drugs so much and think that they are so bad, then why did we legalize the most harmful (cigs) and intoxicating drugs (alcohol).

So, if a crack head steals to get drugs, then, the criminal justice system can make the crack head provide restitution to the victim. How does the victim get there stuff back when a crack head goes to jail, they don’t. In fact, their tax dollars pay for that crack head to get all his teeth replaced. I would be much happier if the victim at least got some type of restitution, at least so one would gain from the situation.

Currently we pay 35,000 each year to incarcerate. I want to make damn sure that every person in there really needs to be separated from society. That was the original purpose behind jails and prisons. They were never intended for mass production. They were supposed to be a last resort for citizens who posed a grave and immediate threat. Not some abstract threat like “poisoning the community”. Hell, my car poisons the community.

They were also not supposed to be used for long durations. Because, when people are isolated, it screws them up.

“Effective to incarcerate” is dependent upon what your goals are. If you want to punish people, then society can always make the punishment more severe. I would say 40 years is pretty severe.

Are you getting your monies worth when it comes to the wod? Most would say no. Most of the people incarcerated are low level dealers or habitual users.

I definitely agree that society needs to differentiate between “victimless” and “non-victimless” crimes but the point is that we are not. That is one of the reasons that it is a complete failure.

The other large reason is that we are passing laws that are unenforceable as well as unnecessary. The vast majority of adults do not use drugs. 3% of all adults smoke weed. That is the largest category of all drugs. Teens don’t really use a lot of drugs either. We have a hyper-fear of widespread drug use that is not supported by the research findings. The most significant population of users occurred in the 60′s and has been declining ever since. Why would our children use drugs, the get a synthetic meth for free which they sell to each other and refer to as addy’s.

There are more teens who are have a scrip for addy’s than use all illicit drugs combined. We use drugs for every problem we have in our culture and then we tell children not to use drugs.

I am curious what effect incarceration has that you think is effective and whether the associated cost justifies our intervention.

I travel to a border city fairly often and every time I come back, I drive though a Border Patrol checkpoint on I-10 in Sierra Blanca, TX. They always wave me on through along with the others in line and I’ve never seen a dog there.

Last summer, as people tried to have their medications refilled, the pharmacies informed us that there was a hold put on all controlled meds written by two doctors here in the city. People–some elderly, sick and handicapped began to go into withdrawal and all the other practices including emergency rooms were naturally reluctant to treat them, much less continue to prescibe opioids for pain or nerve medicine. Many were simply turned away and certain treated as suspects. It was a rough time. It still is. This is supposed to be the government trying to help people??

Our family doctor has been nearly bankrupted by this system…the govt and the lawyers drag the process out for as long as possible. They really like to make examples of certain doctors who do not conform. Our doctor is a long time established respected physician who has did all he could for patient needs including how to save us money. He had/has a large practice that he began in the 1960′s. What apparently happened was that DEA pharmacists filed complaints and the govt. started building a case so they could put out an “Emergency Restriction” on his licence–(in order to protect patients and familes of course.) His goal is to uphold the Hippocratic Oath, plain and simple. He is holding on and doing all he can to fight the charges and get back his good name and his practice. Of course this costing him a great deal.