Just send them to this place that people go when they do bad things.

Our judicial system, like any other, is highly flawed. Nothing is perfect though and I've accepted that. What matters is we try our absolute best, right? My question is if this country does always have its peoples' best interest at heart or their own.

Sending someone to prison is our country's solution to almost every matter. First off, I'm a firm believer in finding the most appropriate sentence for each specific individual. No case is the same. Of course, murderers and sex offenders and repeat offenders need complete punishment for being majorly fucked up people in society and deserve to be locked up. Drug offenders need rehabilitation and psychotherapists helping them deal with whatever issues that have led them to having drug problems. Instead of never being flexible with minimum and maximum terms, no early release acts, and failure to individually analyze each specific person and help them grow and work through their issues in whatever way possible, why not take the extra time and money for this that will pay off in the end instead of shipping everyone off to facilities for however long which in the end will cost taxpayers more money either way. People in prison are either repeat offenders or one time mistakes. Repeat offenders especially need treatment, therapy or just someone to talk to sometimes. Throwing them behind bars time and time again isn't doing anything but wasting our money and their life. They need help figuring out the root of their problems and they need hope and desire to change.

Do me a favor and take a second to google and read about the "prison industrial complex." The United States now imprisons more people than any other country, including China. No, it's not because there are more criminals here. The crime rate has actually gone down since the prison boom. The enormous increase in America's inmate population can be explained in large part by the sentences given to people who have committed crimes other than the murderers, the sex offenders, the thieves. Crimes that in other countries would usually lead to community service, fines, or drug treatment or would not be considered crimes at all in the United States now lead to a prison term, by far the most expensive form of punishment. "No matter what the question has been in American criminal justice over the last generation," says Franklin E. Zimring, the director of the Earl Warren Legal Institute, "prison has been the answer." Is this always the right thing? I'm not even sure.

Don't get me wrong, I've personally chosen to accept my plea offer as opposed to go to trial and I willingly will be going away in two weeks even when my lawyer told me that if there was any case like this that would have a shot at winning, it would be mine. It's still a risk and stress and a heartache that I'd rather not bother to put my family and myself through. I'm not sure how much more I would have been able to handle. I'm just saying that I believe I can do a lot better in society out of prison than not. No, I'm not a celebrity or icon to the general public (which is why they never serve more than a little bit of their sentence by the way; i.e., T.I. going for one year with his 10000th offense this time being holding enough weapons to kill masses.) My parents are getting old though. The State is punishing them most which is the part that hurts me most. I've stressed them out and disappointed them enough in my life and have been doing nothing but working to change that little by little in the past years. Then 2009 happens just as I was getting on the right track. It's ok, shit happens. I'm healthy and alive and still have my life ahead of me. I can make the best of it and have the time for all the thinking I need in there. I can possibly pass on hope to others that might be a little more lost than me as well right? Damn, I'm just babbling now and have no clue what the general purpose of this entry was. I think I need some fresh air.

Ok, there we go. I'll conclude with this: A suitable sentence for me in a make-believe world could possibly be house arrest with the exception of going to work. Staying with my parents for X amount of time to make them rest assure that all is well and so that they are able to witness my daily activities that include working, working and more working. Working toward making a living and accomplishing something in this world, making better use of myself in society, making money so they can sooner retire happily and not worry about me. Trust me, this house arrest idea is completely to benefit my parents. For me, it would probably be more torturous than prison and anyone who really knows them might know why I say this. The only benefit would be the food, sleeping comfortably on a nice bed and being able to shower alone.