Drug Rehab: California's Proposition 36, adopted by voters in 2000 on the promise that rehab programs were more effective than jail time in dealing with chronic drug users, is failing miserably according a Los Angeles Times story by Jack Leonard and Megan Garvey. A study by UCLA researchers found that half of the drug users diverted to rehab programs don't complete it and one quarter never show up. "Some people, quite frankly, don't belong in Prop. 36," Angela Hawken, a UCLA research economist, told state lawmakers at a recent budget hearing. "They're going to fail. They're going to keep failing. We're wasting our money. And we're really ... putting our community in jeopardy by having them on the streets." Prop. 36 was patterned after a similar program in Arizona, which that state's Attorney General said was failing, seven years ago, when California voters adopted it. The lack of a sanction stick was a glaring deficiency of the initiative, obvious at the time of the vote. It was opposed by such certified Hollywood lefties as Carroll O'Connor and Martin Sheen, both of whom knew something about what it takes to keep an addict in treatment.

Quantifying evil gets a skeptical look from Adam Liptak at the NYT. (Hat tip: How Appealing.) The story describes the work of two researchers studying what kinds of murders are considered worse than others. It is not likely that this kind of scale will actually be used in sentencing, but trying to define numerically which murders are the worst comes up in discrimination claims as researchers try to "control" for the legitimate variables. Studying what factors actually cause jurors to render death sentences is worth studying for legislatures to refine their definitions of what is a death-eligible offense.