Short Takes 4/24/2010

 Just some odds and ends that I do not think should get a fuller treatment. These are more ideas that have been found buzzing in my head. Maybe someone can turn them into something useful.

A. Histoplasmosis and Hoosier AIDS. I had a case many years ago dealing with AIDS. The client contracted histoplasmosis while in prison, and he blamed this on the pigeons at the Pendleton Reformatory. While deposing one of the IU docs, he said histoplasmosis was very common in AIDS here, but had no idea why. Many years later, while reading the science fiction novel Them Bones, I came across a scene that gave me an idea why. The scene describes the flight of passenger pigeons passing overhead, blotting out the sun, and doing what pigeons do while flying overhead. I also recall reading that the fly way for passenger pigeons was through the Midwest. Could the fungus be a legacy of the passenger pigeon?

B. Why doesn't the federal government do work release or home detention? I hope this is not a a situation where "we got the printing" does not apply. This will be a subject all sides in Washington will be silent about and tell the taxpayers that the government is being tough on crime.

C. Why is being tough better than being smart? We were tough on Communism and got Vietnam. We were smart and broke the economy of the USSR. We were tough on Iraq until Petraeus got smart and saved our asses. It is almost like Americans prefer being stupid. Maybe it is that the federal government can print all the money it wants, and so there is no need to think on how to wisely spend that money.

D. Do any of the states or the federal government do psych evaluations of people going into and out of our prisons? I will report back on this. If not, why not? Would it be that no one wants to know what sorts are going into prison? Assuming they do not perform any such tests, if they, would this be a key for understanding repeat offenders?

sch

[No psych exams were performed by the federal government before my arrival at Fort Dix FCI or during my stay. I believe, without any specific evidence, that keeping prison populations at a certain level are more important than understanding the people constituting those populations. Remember, prison guards have a union and the union wants its members employed, and prison employment depends on the number of prisoners needing guarded. Mental health services were readily available only for the suicidal. Another way of looking at this is acknowledging American prisons function as a warehouse and being warehouses they are not interested in knowing anything about their inmates other than the bare minimum. Yet another thought crosses my mind, the politicians have made careers on being tough on crimes, this requires dehumanizing the government's prisoners, and only those with humanity merit concern about their mental health. sch 9/30/22]