Move over MIC……here is the Prison Industrial Complex
There are 2.4 million people in American prisons and what are those prisoners doing to fill their days? Working for the MIC and other large corporation for 25 cents to $1.25 per hour.
This country has 5% of the world’s population but we have a whopping 25% of the worlds prisoners…..WTF. The prison population has increased by 500% in the last 3 years and the reason is twofold, contracted prisons with high occupancy guarantees and predatory capitalism.
You may be surprised to know that prisoners produce 100% of helmets, uniforms, bedding rolls, flak vests, shoes etc. for the military for less per hour than third world workers are paid. Prison labor also produces wiring harnesses for jets and tanks just to scratch the surface.
This industry (slavery) employs more people than any Fortune 500 company other than General Motors. So be aware that the next time you make a hotel reservation it could well be a inmate on the other end of the phone working for a fraction of third world wages.
Jackson
March 2, 2016 3:50 pm
Interesting chart but it needs a bit of explaining.
1. Original Liberals were nothing like today’s liberals. Original Liberals were ones who believed in the principles of the Declaration of Independence (Called The Creed by many and Americanism by me.) As is obvious to anyone, today’s liberals are big government Progressives.
2. Original Conservatives were NOT at all near the Freedom Zone. Unlike with Americanism, Original Conservatives did not believe that man had God given rights to life, liberty, property, and happiness. Original Conservatives, whose political philosophy comes from Thomas Hobbes and Edmund Burke, believed in a strong government (centralized for Hobbes, decentralized for Burke.) They believed in government education and religious conformity. Mercantilism, which favors the wealthy, was their favored economic model. For Original Conservatives, government piped the tune and the people marched to it.
3. Americanism is the only political philosophy which meets the Freedom Zone criteria of free market, freedom, and personal rights.
AC
March 2, 2016 3:57 pm
“The real division is not between conservatives and revolutionaries but between authoritarians and libertarians.” – Orwell, 1948
Bea Lever
March 2, 2016 4:06 pm
As an aside…..20+ states in the US are bringing back debtors prison/work houses. How well can you sew??
Jackson
March 2, 2016 4:12 pm
Bea….. The Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) is one of the things that’s seriously wrong with America as you suggest. But it’s not because the inmates work for corporations or because millions are being imprisoned for crimes they’ve committed. The problem with the PIC, as studies and experience has shown, is that it doesn’t meet the Criminal Justice System’s goal of protecting the public. Having hanging judges lock up the criminals as the favored solution to damn near every offense has led to high recidivism rates. That means the public continues to be victimized. If the State and it’s agents (the DAs and judges) aren’t willing to address reducing crime by using the most successful sentencing methods, as high crime rates have shown that they aren’t, then I think we ought to go back to executing every person-crime felon. That would make the good old U S of A a much safer place to live and keep the Administrator from having to worry every time he has to drive through the 30 Blocks.
rhs jr
March 2, 2016 4:27 pm
The Slaves work for their Masters who don’t work but collect cash and benefits. In a Democracy, the Slaves are the taxpayers and the Masters are the professional protesters and no ID serial voters.
Bea Lever
March 2, 2016 4:33 pm
Jackson- Predatory capitalism in the contracted prisons is a 70 Billion dollar a year industry alone, that’s before you even get into the slave labor. There is also a system of predatory banksters in the prisons raping families of the inmates. In order to send a inmate $50 , you have to fork over $70 to the required bankster shakedown.
In other words, there is BIG money in prisons/prison labor in this country and there seems to be no oversight.
goofyfoot
March 2, 2016 7:58 pm
Thinker
March 3, 2016 10:20 am
AC, that’s a very telling quote from Orwell. I just read this piece (very long) about how Americans are becoming increasingly authoritarian.
This trend had been accelerated in recent years by demographic and economic changes such as immigration, which “activated” authoritarian tendencies, leading many Americans to seek out a strongman leader who would preserve a status quo they feel is under threat and impose order on a world they perceive as increasingly alien.
Authoritarians are thought to express much deeper fears than the rest of the electorate, to seek the imposition of order where they perceive dangerous change, and to desire a strong leader who will defeat those fears with force. They would thus seek a candidate who promised these things. And the extreme nature of authoritarians’ fears, and of their desire to challenge threats with force, would lead them toward a candidate whose temperament was totally unlike anything we usually see in American politics — and whose policies went far beyond the acceptable norms.
That piece clearly takes aim at neoconservatism at the same time it ignores the same thing is happening on the neoliberal side. Both represent sides of the same Authoritarian coin.
Freedom vs Slavery??
Move over MIC……here is the Prison Industrial Complex
There are 2.4 million people in American prisons and what are those prisoners doing to fill their days? Working for the MIC and other large corporation for 25 cents to $1.25 per hour.
This country has 5% of the world’s population but we have a whopping 25% of the worlds prisoners…..WTF. The prison population has increased by 500% in the last 3 years and the reason is twofold, contracted prisons with high occupancy guarantees and predatory capitalism.
You may be surprised to know that prisoners produce 100% of helmets, uniforms, bedding rolls, flak vests, shoes etc. for the military for less per hour than third world workers are paid. Prison labor also produces wiring harnesses for jets and tanks just to scratch the surface.
This industry (slavery) employs more people than any Fortune 500 company other than General Motors. So be aware that the next time you make a hotel reservation it could well be a inmate on the other end of the phone working for a fraction of third world wages.
Interesting chart but it needs a bit of explaining.
1. Original Liberals were nothing like today’s liberals. Original Liberals were ones who believed in the principles of the Declaration of Independence (Called The Creed by many and Americanism by me.) As is obvious to anyone, today’s liberals are big government Progressives.
2. Original Conservatives were NOT at all near the Freedom Zone. Unlike with Americanism, Original Conservatives did not believe that man had God given rights to life, liberty, property, and happiness. Original Conservatives, whose political philosophy comes from Thomas Hobbes and Edmund Burke, believed in a strong government (centralized for Hobbes, decentralized for Burke.) They believed in government education and religious conformity. Mercantilism, which favors the wealthy, was their favored economic model. For Original Conservatives, government piped the tune and the people marched to it.
3. Americanism is the only political philosophy which meets the Freedom Zone criteria of free market, freedom, and personal rights.
“The real division is not between conservatives and revolutionaries but between authoritarians and libertarians.” – Orwell, 1948
As an aside…..20+ states in the US are bringing back debtors prison/work houses. How well can you sew??
Bea….. The Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) is one of the things that’s seriously wrong with America as you suggest. But it’s not because the inmates work for corporations or because millions are being imprisoned for crimes they’ve committed. The problem with the PIC, as studies and experience has shown, is that it doesn’t meet the Criminal Justice System’s goal of protecting the public. Having hanging judges lock up the criminals as the favored solution to damn near every offense has led to high recidivism rates. That means the public continues to be victimized. If the State and it’s agents (the DAs and judges) aren’t willing to address reducing crime by using the most successful sentencing methods, as high crime rates have shown that they aren’t, then I think we ought to go back to executing every person-crime felon. That would make the good old U S of A a much safer place to live and keep the Administrator from having to worry every time he has to drive through the 30 Blocks.
The Slaves work for their Masters who don’t work but collect cash and benefits. In a Democracy, the Slaves are the taxpayers and the Masters are the professional protesters and no ID serial voters.
Jackson- Predatory capitalism in the contracted prisons is a 70 Billion dollar a year industry alone, that’s before you even get into the slave labor. There is also a system of predatory banksters in the prisons raping families of the inmates. In order to send a inmate $50 , you have to fork over $70 to the required bankster shakedown.
In other words, there is BIG money in prisons/prison labor in this country and there seems to be no oversight.
AC, that’s a very telling quote from Orwell. I just read this piece (very long) about how Americans are becoming increasingly authoritarian.
The rise of American authoritarianism
This trend had been accelerated in recent years by demographic and economic changes such as immigration, which “activated” authoritarian tendencies, leading many Americans to seek out a strongman leader who would preserve a status quo they feel is under threat and impose order on a world they perceive as increasingly alien.
Authoritarians are thought to express much deeper fears than the rest of the electorate, to seek the imposition of order where they perceive dangerous change, and to desire a strong leader who will defeat those fears with force. They would thus seek a candidate who promised these things. And the extreme nature of authoritarians’ fears, and of their desire to challenge threats with force, would lead them toward a candidate whose temperament was totally unlike anything we usually see in American politics — and whose policies went far beyond the acceptable norms.
That piece clearly takes aim at neoconservatism at the same time it ignores the same thing is happening on the neoliberal side. Both represent sides of the same Authoritarian coin.