Peggy Noonan has this column in the WSJ, titled Trump and the Rise of the Unprotected: Why political professionals are struggling to make sense of the world they created.
But I keep thinking of how Donald Trump got to be the very likely Republican nominee. There are many answers and reasons, but my thoughts keep revolving around the idea of protection. It is a theme that has been something of a preoccupation in this space over the years, but I think I am seeing it now grow into an overall political dynamic throughout the West.
There are the protected and the unprotected. The protected make public policy. The unprotected live in it. The unprotected are starting to push back, powerfully.
The protected are the accomplished, the secure, the successful--those who have power or access to it. They are protected from much of the roughness of the world. More to the point, they are protected from the world they have created. Again, they make public policy and have for some time.
Ms. Noonan goes on to focus on immigration, but the principle applies to crime as well. It is easy to be blase about crime when you are personally safe, or at least think you are.* * *They are figures in government, politics and media. They live in nice neighborhoods, safe ones. Their families function, their kids go to good schools, they've got some money. All of these things tend to isolate them, or provide buffers. Some of them--in Washington it is important officials in the executive branch or on the Hill; in Brussels, significant figures in the European Union--literally have their own security details.
Because they are protected they feel they can do pretty much anything, impose any reality. They're insulated from many of the effects of their own decisions.
The notion that our prisons are full of people who don't need to be there, locked up for possession of a single joint of marijuana, is patently false and easily determined to be so by anyone who bothers to look. The notion that we can release large numbers of prisoners who have either violent histories, long criminal histories, or both (i.e., the people actually in state prison) and actually improve public safety in the process is so contrary to common sense that one would have to be astonishingly naive to believe it without compelling evidence. Yet too many of the people Ms. Noonan calls "the protected" do believe it, waving glossy reports by pro-criminal think tanks that are really quite superficial if you just poke a millimeter below the surface.
The price of this folly is paid mostly by people in poor-to-modest neighborhoods.
Are too many people living behind bars in America? You bet they are -- just drive through one of those neighborhoods and see how many houses have bars on the windows.
"The three-judge court credited substantial evidence that prison populations can be reduced in a manner that does not increase crime to a significant degree. Some evidence indicated that reducing overcrowding in California’s pris- ons could even improve public safety."
From Plata. Seems like the blasé attitude has five votes on the Supreme Court.
Emphasis added:
"The three-judge court credited substantial evidence that prison populations can be reduced in a manner that does not increase crime to a SIGNIFICANT degree."
The word "significant" tells exactly the tale Kent is showcasing with this entry.
Q: What is a "significant" increase in crime? A: When some muckety-muck gets yoked or his 15 year-old gets hooked on cocaine.
Q: What is an "insignificant" increase in crime? A: When some schmuck (i.e., not a judge, legislator or academic) gets yoked or his 15 year-old gets hooked on cocaine.
So, Kent, Bill and federlist, are you all now jumping on the Donald Trump bandwagon along with former US Attorneys Chris Christie and Jeff Sessions?
Just curious not only if he has your support, but also whether you think he will be to your liking on a variety of criminal justice issues.
Doug, how on earth you could possibly have read that into the original post or either of the comments completely escapes me.
I did not read anything into the post or the comments, which is why I asked a question. And I will ask it again: are any or all of you folks now on the Trump bandwagon?
I mentioned the recent endorsements of Sen Sessions and Gov Christie because both were prominent US Attorneys before become GOP politicians, and the primary contributors to this blog typically take a pro-prosecution perspective on most crime and punishment issues.
Please understand, I am not trying to play gotcha here, just eager to get the views of smart folks I respect who focus on criminal justice issues. I personally think Trump could --- though I am not sure he would --- become a leading and consequential voice on marijuana reform and other issues I think about a lot these days. (Think "Nixon goes to China."). Also, in a prior post, Bill noted Trump's forceful advocacy for the death penalty for cop killers.
Assuming the pols are right and Trump will win all but a few states on Super Tuesday, I am eager to hear about whether he has support from some tradition law-and-order types, especially given the Supreme Court vacancy and also debates over sentencing reform at both the federal and state levels.
Nope, not jumping on any bandwagon.
Thanks for the direct answer, Kent, and now I am eager to hear from Bill and federalist.
FYI: I will wait see Super Tuesday results before asking the (forthcoming?) general election question of HRC v. DJT.
It's been years since I could jump.
And now back to the topic of the entry.
Doug -- Do you agree that the inside-the-Beltway, Establishment crowd who (along with you) supports sentencing reduction is among the "protected" class, while those who will be hurt (or killed) by criminals released early are disproportionately among the "unprotected" class? See, e.g., the three unimportant (to big shots) people killed by Wendell Callahan.
If Dick Durbin and Pat Leahy and Mike Lee and John Cornyn lived in the neighborhood where Callahan's victims lived, do you think they'd be so eager to see drug pushers back on the street early?
I do not disagree that members of Congress are largely insulated from the full impact of the laws they enact, but this is true when they makes criminal laws that are unduly harsh and lack mens rea as well as those that seek to remedy these problem.
Critically, inner city communities now tend to vote overwhelmingly against the GOP candidates who advocate for tough and tougher sentencing, so it seems that certain communities do want sentencing reform even when it means releasing more former drug offenders back into their communities.
I must now add that the last GWB Attorney General in a new op-ed in The Hill, writing with a long-time police chief, states expressly: "We can firmly say that sentencing reform done right will not harm public safety. In fact, it will enhance it."
http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2016/03/former-ag-mukasey-delivers-clear-message-to-gop-on-srca-law-enforcement-asks-you-to-pass-this-bill-.html
In light of this op-ed, I am now especially eager to hear in this thread or others:
-- if Kent thinks this former AG is "astonishingly naive" and/or
-- if federalist thinks this former AG has a "blasé attitude" and/or
-- if Bill, who has written that this former AG "was widely and correctly praised for his fair-mindedness, sobriety and integrity," think this former AG now been somehow "bought" by the Koch brothers to become a supporter of the SRCA.
Douglas stated: "Critically, inner city communities now tend to vote overwhelmingly against the GOP candidates who advocate for tough and tougher sentencing, so it seems that certain communities do want sentencing reform even when it means releasing more former drug offenders back into their communities."
Nonsense. They vote against the GOP regardless of an individual politician's view on sentencing. Rand Paul is one of the most genuine supporters of sentence reform, but his numbers in the black community in Kentucky were barely over 10% when he ran in 2010.
Bill Clinton put into place a lot of the harsher sentencing and he is "The First Black President."
Good points, Tarls, though I wonder if you dispute that, generally speaking, members and representatives of inner-city communities tend to advocate more for sentencing reform than members and representatives of suburban and rural communities.
On the Senate side, in particular, I tend to think of sentencing reform supporters like Dick Durban and Cory Booker as being the types of folks who get support for their sentencing reform advocacy more from members of inner-city communities.
On the Rand Paul front, prior to his election in 2010, he was not yet known as a vocal advocate for sentencing reform. Moreover, given that even moderate folks like John McCain and Mitt Romney got only around 5% of the black vote, at 10% showing for a GOP candidate in this arena is not bad. Finally, the real test will be 2016: do you think Senator Paul will get more or less of the black vote in KY now that he has been so vocal and consistent in his advocacy for sentencing reforms?
One of the strangest and most disheartening aspects of post-Civil Rights Act American politics is the extent to which inner city neighborhoods repeatedly elect representatives who are more interested in feeding and expanding the racial grievance machine than in taking the steps that will actually make things better. This is not by any means limited to criminal justice issues but rather is across the board.
For the long version, see Juan Williams, Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America--and What We Can Do About It. Unfortunately, that book was published nine years ago, and the situation has gotten no better.
Doug,
Kent's post pretty much nails it.
I also suggest you take a look at this picture:
https://img.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=http://content.gallup.com/origin/gallupinc/GallupSpaces/Production/Cms/POLL/xf3yrrqsyewawdg-58dujg.png&w=1484
5%?
Not exactly a mandate for a huge change.
Your question for me is just so much silliness. I continue to think General Mukasey is correctly praised for his fair-mindedness, sobriety and integrity. It's an honor to know him and to have appeared with him.
How obvious is it that fine men sometimes make big mistakes? Reagan did, as did both Presidents Bush, Chief Justice Rehnquist (Dickerson) and Justice Scalia (Blakely).
I have never implied that everyone backing the SRCA is bought off. Don't use this forum to suggest otherwise.
Tarls, arguably every issue that polls 7% or higher for blacks in what you linked is related to dissatisfaction with the drug war and modern mass incarceration.
And sorry Bill to suggest wrongly you think everyone on the GOP side has be influenced by Koch money in this space. (And, for the record, I think Justice Scalia nailed it in Blakely. I think federalist agrees, too.
Doug,
I think it is an enormous stretch to believe that when blacks said "economy" or "jobs" or "race relations" or "homelessness", they were thinking about sentencing reform.
It is a stretch but not an enormous one, Tarls, especially since I think about sentencing reform as including:
(1) moving away from criminal justice approaches to drug issues (which could help with race relations, esp w/police) and legalizing marijuana (which has helped the CO economy and job rate, though arguably has also increased migration of homeless to CO), and
(2) reducing most/all of the collateral consequences of any conviction, which very much impacts jobs and housing and lots of other like issues for inner-city folks who have a drug conviction or a family member with a drug conviction.
There is a difference between an academic seeing a connection between "jobs" and "sentencing reform" and a person being asked their most important issue by Gallup and saying "jobs" but meaning sentencing reform.
Using your formulation, there is virtually no answer that blacks could have given that would not mean sentencing reform to you.
There is an old scientific saying that if no data could disprove your theory, you are not really engaging in science. That fits here.
Instead, it's a kobayashi maru.