Should private prisons be outlawed?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

http://uk.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUKTRE51C0EP20090213

U.S. judges admit to jailing children for money

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Two judges pleaded guilty on Thursday to accepting more than $2.6 million from a private youth detention centre in Pennsylvania in return for giving hundreds of youths and teenagers long sentences.

Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan of the Court of Common Pleas in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, entered plea agreements in federal court in Scranton admitting that they took payoffs from PA Childcare and a sister company, Western PA Childcare, between 2003 and 2006.

So there is such a thing as giving corruption a bad name...

[opebo]

with prisoners having a hand in the running of the prison.

They do already, a lot of the term. Er... some prisoners anyway. A certain sort of prisoner.

Haha, good one.  I was envisioning something more like participatory democracy, but I see your point.  However, keep in mind the tough ones raping and beating the lesser ones are really just implementing US government policy as applied through the prison system. 

[Torie]

We have private prisons now. They work fine. The concerns about that are largely strawmen. The idea freaks out the prison guard union however, which is an indication that the idea has considerable merit.

[Coburn In 2012]

Life on Planet Liberalia...

Murderers, rapists, child molesters and drug dealers get TV sets, manicures, college educations and anger management classes.

I guess it makes sense the liberals would create life like that behind bars.  Because people that have not yet been arrested are often on welfare and using their food stamps to buy snack cakes, pop tarts, candy, smokes and malt liquor.

All I can say is they like upside down living in a world that should right side up

[opebo]

We have private prisons now. They work fine. The concerns about that are largely strawmen.

Anecdotal evidence suggests otherwise - everyone I know who has been interned in a 'private prison' has expressed the view that they are far worse than the 'public' kind (which are bad enough, certainly).

Life on Planet Liberalia...

Murderers, rapists, child molesters and drug dealers get TV sets, manicures, college educations and anger management classes.

All I can say is they like upside down living in a world that should right side up

Dude, life on Planet Right Wing (the status quo, as you fellows do after all control everything) = the real killers live in opulent seclusion in Palm Springs, the Hamptons, etc., and we blame some poor powerless black for what's going on.

[SPC]

of course.  remove 'private' as well and I would again tend to agree.

Yes. Restitution should come before punishment.