Comments

1

"But we need to think of bills like these together as a group that expands the criminal punishment system."

Even the ones that prohibit the sale of high capacity magazines (SB-5078). Good government demands specific bills to address specific problems. Your aggregation is a gimmick to promote a narrative that doesn't understand the law.

3

This could also be entitled we should expand victimization in WA state. It is horrible we incarcerate so many people but at some point the needs of the community outweigh the needs of the criminal. If someone is unable or unwilling to abide by the rules of society they need to be kept away from society lest they do further harm. In all these discussions I never hear the voice of the untold collateral damage that is caused by abolishing jails. In NYC right now a young woman is dead, stabbed 40 times by a person who followed her home. Turns out that person has 3 cases pending against them right now and was out of jail due to bail reform. Someone is now dead because of these policies, where is her voice?

https://abcnews.go.com/amp/US/35-year-woman-stabbed-death-manhattan-apartment-seemingly/story?id=82877921

5

always the Symptoms
never the Causes
pragmatic
we're
Not

6

@4:

Bullshit. The majority of Americans want police to stop killing BIPOC's and are overwhelmingly in favor of systemically reforming law enforcement institutions:

https://www.vox.com/2021/5/3/22406099/police-reform-chauvin-congress

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2021/10/police-reform-polls-white-black-crime.html

https://www.brookings.edu/research/a-better-path-forward-for-criminal-justice-police-reform/

7

"Criminalization does not actually reduce harm or make our society safer – it makes things worse. "

Interesting claim. Prove it.

Start by presenting examples of comparably-sized nations with no police and no criminal justice system of any kind -- in short, where nothing is criminalized -- and demonstrating how the citizens of those nations are safer than US citizens.

9

There was a double murder over in Okanogan County, and the Sheriff's office is fanning the flames of outrage by claiming that deputies twice saw a "person of interest" who ran from them, but there was nothing they could do because of the WA state laws that coddle criminals.

Of course the morons over there lap it up with a spoon.

But I blame Democrats for ignoring the rural areas. Most of Eastern WA is a welfare state that exists largely because of big government largess. The Democrats should be beating that point into the skull of ever resident, but they won't even show their face over there.

10

@7,

"Start by presenting examples of comparably-sized nations with no police and no criminal justice system of any kind -- in short, where nothing is criminalized.."

Who the fuck is arguing for this? I bet I could teach my dog better reading comprehension skills than you're demonstrating here. It's right there in the headline... "Stop Expanding Criminalization." Key in on that second word there for a few minutes and see if you can figure it out.

14

Who in their right mind doesn’t want criminals held accountable? Send them all to jail. That would take care of 80 percent of the homeless problem in Seattle.

16

Raindrop dear, condolences on the school levy. You should move to Grand Coulee. We recently had a school levy rejected by 60% of the voters. (That levy would have gotten the district a matching $700k grant from the state).

The reason? The property taxes are too high.

Our property tax over there is $800/year.

17

@16: It's the prerogative of the voter when you have school funding, or anything, from property taxes. If we switched to a state income tax, and gave property owners relief, I'd be in favor of that.

19

What the author is missing is a solution.... sure she decrying "criminalization" does nothing to stop the problem, but neither does "non criminalizing" the act make it better... in fact if we are to believe the crime stats... "doing nothing...which is what the author seems to suggest" has actually made it worse.

Rather than being a "problem announcer" if the author could provide a solution, this might make a more interesting read.

From a citizen perspective, arrest, incarcerate and get them off the streets looks way more attractive than giving them a pat on head, a cookie and sending them back out on the street.

20

@16 - don't forget that the woke commies in gummint are just going to take your $800 and use some of it to teach kids that white people is bad and the rest to teach them to have sex with animals. Your point about the welfare state over there is spot on. Time we cut off their checks.

21

How about we stop jailing people for shit like simple drug possession and increase jailing of people like robbers, thieves, murderers, etc.?

Let's start with a mandatory 10 years for illegal possession of a firearm. Taking that crowd (people who are already felons and carry guns around) off the streets for a good long time would improve society greatly. And the high-capacity magazine ban is pretty hard to argue with. I bet even those nice countries like Norway who allegedly pat criminals on the head and give them a cookie would have something to say if they caught you with a garage full of military-grade weapons.

22

@21

You first have to arrest them.

That is going to be pretty hard to do in Seattle at present.

But I believe we agree, a pat on the head or catch and release isn't cutting it.

23

@10: "Who the fuck is arguing for this?"

Leah Montagne, in the quote which begins @7: "Criminalization does not actually reduce harm or make our society safer – it makes things worse. "

'It's right there in the headline... "Stop Expanding Criminalization."'

Yes, the headline says expanding criminalization is the problem, but partway through the post, she drops the qualifier and pivots to the strict abolitionist position, again as quoted @7 and above. It's a classic bait-and-switch expansion of an argument, and it's not @7's fault you missed it entirely.

Given how badly the abolitionist candidates lost in Seattle's November elections, I'll speculate Montagne's rhetorical slight-of-hand was fully intentional.

26

I'm totally on board with reducing the overall size and scope of the criminal justice apparatus at all levels (other than high-level white-collar crime, of course) but the first four of these five bills just happen to be good, appropriate uses of said system -- especially the first, gun-related one. The fifth one (shoplifting) does strike me as constitutionally dubious and quite likely a racial-equity minefield, but to reflexively oppose all five of these bills in single-minded pursuit of abolition is the very definition of foolish consistency.


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