 Don’t punish violent criminals like nonviolent ones
We make a dangerous and costly mistake when we fail to differentiate or separate violent sex offenders from nonviolent sex offenders. There is good reason to be
concerned about violent sex offenders but imprisoning the completely nonviolent sex offender for life or 25 years or more, as our governor proposes, is unnecessary, unconstitutional and outrageous.
If he wants to save the taxpayers of this state millions of dollars he will sort
out the violent and dangerous criminals in our prisons from the virtually harmless.
Nonviolent criminals can be paroled and monitored after they have served their
time. Pot dealers and other virtually harmless “criminals” are treated
the same (pot is an herb, governor is a dope).
We have completely nonviolent prisoners in our most expensive prisons, costing
the taxpayers a 100 thousand dollars a year. In this country that boasts of “liberty
and justice for all” we have the highest prison population in the world.
Don Johnson
Minneapolis
Do we really have a democracy in this country?
What is a democracy? Do we bamboozle ourselves into thinking we in the United
States have a democracy, or that there isn’t something better than the
current democracy we live in? Perhaps we have more freedoms, or rather different
types of freedoms, than some people in other places, but do we have as much
freedom as we think we have, or as much freedom as we could ideally have?
The World Book Encyclopedia says that in a democracy, the people elect representatives
to make laws. The people run for office and remove officials who behave improperly.
Many countries that claim to be democracies actually have an authoritarian government.
In such countries, relatively few people have power and most citizens play a
limited role in making decisions. Authoritarian government may rule by persuasion,
force, or both (World Book Encyclopedia, 1989, Volume, 21 pg. 409-410).
After reading this, ask yourself, do we, in the U.S. have a democracy, and if
so, what kind of democracy do we have? Who has the power? How much do you, the
citizen, get to say, and how much does your opinion matter?
Perhaps your baby boy, your nephew/niece, your cousin, your boyfriend/girlfriend,
and/or your husband/wife is in Iraq, not knowing exactly why, and has relatively
no voice in being there, and you, at home, do you have much say? Is this a democratic
way to operate?
The current U.S. president believes he has been elected by the popular vote
and will therefore do what he wants, when he wants, and how he wants even though
33 percent of the population, at best, supports him (taking into consideration
principles of voting and elections).
Now our administration is accusing Iran of having threatening weapons, too,
after they just closed the case on Iraq having found NO WMD. They didn’t
learn much from that experience, apparently. How much say do we citizens have
in this?
I think our democracy, our administration, can do better and give us citizens
more freedom and voice, and lead us out of this war rather than deeper into
another.
Jessica Thoennes
St. Paul
|
