I just finished reading Del. Jason Ballard’s panicked commentary “Safer streets, safer communities” [March 1] that detailed the pitched battle Virginia House Republicans have waged against the "leftist" Democrats in the Senate. Apparently, all their attempts to put more people behind bars and keep them there longer have been stymied by liberals and their soft-on-crime agenda.
Perk up, Del. Ballard, this is fake news. I recently read an article about a massive prison that El Salvador is building as part of their dictator’s own war on crime. To highlight the enormity of the prison, the article included a comparison of the top 10 most populous prisons in the world. The prison will easily surpass the population at the number 10 prison, San Quentin State Prison, California, or number nine, Cook County Jail, Chicago; also number seven, Louisiana State Penitentiary, and even the number three prison, Rikers Island, New York.
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What?!? On a list of the top 10 prisons in the world, the USA owns four spots, and "leftist states” own three of the four. Wait, there’s more. The USA occupies the number one position for total incarcerated, surpassing number two China by a whopping 500,000. The USA also has the highest incarceration rate per capita, dominating the rest of the world with a rate of 629/100,000. Virginia, not to be outdone, incarcerates our citizens at a rate of 749/100,000. In fact, Virginia has more people behind bars than Mohammed bin Salman has in Saudi Arabia. What’s more impressive is we accomplish this with 27 million fewer citizens than Saudi Arabia.
To be honest, having read your campaign bio, I would have expected you, a seasoned trial lawyer, to know the sad truth about judicial reform in America. Specifically, almost all attempts at judicial reform have been sabotaged, and our prison population alone is proof that "lock ‘em away and throw away the key" is a politician’s tactic to raise money and not a strategy to lower crime.
I’m also reminded of a verse from the song “The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia.” Hmm, what was that song about?
Keith Franklin, Madison Heights
