Politics-Tomorrow is Memorial Day, in the USA. As an honorably discharged Veteran I look back at my time riding subs in the Navy with Pride. I really do love what this country stands for: Freedom, Liberty; and if you work hard you will be rewarded. That’s why I gave up over six months of my life to protect it. It’s been over 20 years since I was in the Navy and things have changed-I’ve changed. The core values of American thought have not changed. What has happened is simply that what I might define as freedom, is not what Bush or Chaney would say is freedom. Words like Freedom; Liberty, free to own a gun- those are spoken and each listener hears it and self-defines its meaning. It’s only when we discuss what “Freedom” means, do we find a wide array of different opinions. I believe that we Americans need to tell our elected leaders what we believe “Freedom” to be and not to have them dictate to us what our freedom will be. I don’t think that it is legitimate for our elected leaders to go on and on about how free we Americans are when our country has the highest incarceration rate and more prisoners than any other country in the world. This stat comes from www.pewcenteroneestates.org. How can anyone call mass imprisonment of our children; Mom’s, Dad’s, Veterans, Freedom? How can we call ourselves a free society when we have to lock up such a large part of our population? When western European Countries have the same level of freedom as we in America do, yet the amount of prisoners per set group of population is 10th what it is in America. Why? The rate of imprisonment in the US is 738 per 100,000 residents. Compare that to Frances 88 per 100,000 residents; or Japan’s 62 per 100,000—It’s an outrage to say that America is the land of the free. This is not what I fought to protect when I was not in the U.S. Navy. [this above information can be found at www.crc.org/nccd/pubs/2006nov_factsheet_incarceration.pdf] I don’t fault the average American. Hell, when I was “free” I really couldn’t give a damn who or how many were in prison. I figured “well, if a person’s in prison they must have done something”. Maybe that was 100% or 90% true at one time. But with DNA being used to prove over 300 people innocent—and that’s just death row cases with usable DNA. I see the injustice being handed out for the sake of expedience. The politics of the “war on crime” and the “war on drugs”, have become a means to manage and contain our poor and mentally ill. With the police using more and more paramilitary tactics and becoming more hostile toward the target classes—poor, Latino, homeless, mentally ill, drug users and blacks. America is truly becoming a country of haves and locked-ups. Social Darwinism at it’s best. Or should I say at its most perverted. As this and every other day passes and you-the person reading this-are free, count yourself blessed. I was, I was blessed, but I got caught up in drugs and was running from a mental illness. Things got bad and there was nowhere to turn to get help. All the beds were full at the inn—so to speak. And as happens much too often in America, I ended up in the criminal justice system—they always have a bed. So maybe while counting your blessings, reflect on why there are so few mental health facilities and so few drug rehab beds. Why Americans are being turned away from that type of help, where as the jail and prison always have a bed. I believe that we need, as a society, to move away from mass incarceration and move to a public health response to drug abuse and mental illness. Please, I’m asking you the reader to look further into this and form your own conclusion. If you think I’m wrong—let me know. Let me know specifically. In closing I want to express my solidarity with all the men and women in the US Armed forces. Whatever your faith or non-faith, I’m with you in my thoughts. Be safe and come back. With Respect, Veritas I wish to let the reader know that some of the information in this blog came from a paper by Jason Mallory. State University of New York at Binghamton. Thank you Mr. Mallory.