Pubdate: Mon, 20 Feb 2012
Source: Toronto Star (CN ON)
Copyright: 2012 The Toronto Star
Contact:  http://www.thestar.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/456
Author: Joe Fiorito, City Columnist 

OMNIBUS CRIME BILL'S UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES

The omnibus crime bill is a freight train of unintended consequences.
Here are some examples:

By increasing the penalties for the production of marijuana, many
small-time growers - people who are unlikely to take a bigger risk -
will get out of the game.

The unintended consequence?

When the small fry leave, the field becomes bigger and more profitable
for the hard-core growers, the professional gangs who know how to
protect themselves, and who are thus in a position to reap big
financial rewards when the price of pot rises.

The bad guys get richer?

I'd say that's an unintended consequence.

Okay, but the bill will send a lot more people to jail for drug
offences; presumably, by doing so, we are cleansing society of drugs.

That has never been the case in human history.

And what of the people who do get caught? It is easy to get drugs in
jail, and many of these drugs are hard drugs, but it is hard to get
clean needles.

And where is there unsafe sex? In jail. And what happens to people who
practice unsafe sex and who share dirty needles? They get sick.

The unintended consequence?

By trying to make society safe, we are making people sick; they will
get sick with the kind of illnesses that are lifelong, costly to
treat, and an unintended burden on the health care system.

Let's move on.

The majority of people in jail are parents. The crime bill does not
address the needs of children.

The unintended consequence?

We punish parents, and at the same time we are punishing children for
the sins of their parents.

Happy Family Day.

Now here's how the bill is racist; you can decide for yourselves if
this is intended or unintended:

One in three women in federal jails is aboriginal, and one of five men
in federal jails is aboriginal; provincial figures are slightly
higher. At the moment, judges are required to take into account the
aboriginal context prior to sentencing.

The crime bill takes that away.

Now let's come at the bill from another angle: We take people out of
society to punish them, and to make society safer. But we will be
putting more people in jail, while doing nothing more about
rehabilitation.

I heard a guy say this, during a panel discussion a while ago - and
he's a guy who has spent time in jail: "People who lose hope take more
chances - they don't care what they do to others, or themselves. When
I was doing my thing, I figured if I'm going in, I might as well go in
with gusto. The crime bill creates that kind of mindset."

He also said that, if you put people in jail without providing rehab,
you create people who are edgy and angry when they are released.

Yikes.

At the moment, the most successful program we have for treating drug
offenders is drug treatment court, a place where people are given
clear and reasonable choices between doing time and cleaning up.

The omnibus bill, if it were a good bill, would pour more money into
drug treatment court.

It does not.

Here's a statistic, if you like that sort of thing: nearly one quarter
of all the people in prison in the world are American. We are heading
in that direction.

You know what bugs me: the right is always yapping about how the left
likes to engage in social engineering.

Here is Stephen Harper, with his hands on the nation's throttle,
instructing his cheerless fireman Vic Toews to pour more coals on the
fire.

Train wreck ahead. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard R Smith Jr.