[Critch]

My Dad was an assistant warden at Ft Pillow Prison in West Tennessee in the 1940s. The prisoners raised their own food, raised their own cotton, picked it, sold it etc, if they were good, they could be rented out to farmers and got to keep half their money in an account till they got out...when the got out they were given new clothes, shoes, etc, and help finding a job, yes, generally farm or labor, but a job.

The really bad ones were on chain gangs, if you broke too many rules you were on the gang, but he told me he rarely saw too many repeat offenders after a few months on a chain gang.

Our local jail is ran very well, it's not a tent city, but it is sparse, but safe for prisoners, food is good, some TV, games etc for good prisoners, and it doesn't cost an arm and a leg per prisoner.

But I am like a lot of people, I am tired of prisons being a breeding ground for more crime, frankly, we have hundreds of islands in the Aleutians that need to be colonzed, maybe an American Botany Bay would work for some of these folks...it won't happen, but we can dream.

A good friend of mine is a guard at Jackson Prison in Michigan, he tells me horror stories.. Here in MIssouri we have the death penalty and it is used enough to get their attention, what do you do with a guy in Michigan who is there for life for murder and he kills another prisoner or a guard?