Mike Smullin

Ok I have a constructive idea to reform our broken justice system, which addresses things like gun violence, mental health, and drug abuse:

“[Chicago has] the equivalent of a newtown every 4 months.” —Obama
Ya this is the real problem. Who will enter these cities and be an agent for change?
The police are empowered to use force, but they are outgunned by organized crime.
Or the law prevents them from taking action despite their gut instincts.

Everyone living in those cities knows who the troublemakers are. Anything short of a snitch hotline and the ability of law enforcement to collaboratively (multi-state, federal, and military if necessary) follow up on those leads with prejudice is probably just cutting around the edges.

Why don’t we have the marines clearing out those ghettos like they do in Afghanistan?

Droning street thugs would be very effective. 
Can’t there be a policy that if you will dress in community-recognized gang apparel you will be treated as a suspect/criminal without due process?

Is this about gun control or violent crime control? 

If we cannot fight violence with violence, if we are limited to peaceful means, 
then we must begin to address the mental pathology; in these cases we’re no more developed as a nation than Afghanistan and Pakistan.
these blighted areas are places of impoverishment, domestic violence abuses, sub-standard education, and limited opportunity.
Mental and physical handicaps go without treatment, and education is unusually difficult—leaving individuals with no skills, no job, no money; dependency on social programs, and ultimately reliance on crime organization to get them the rest of the way through life.
Although, when you think about it, the line between business and organized crime gets thinner the higher up you go in profitability.
Really these are entrepreneurs without legitimate opportunities. This is where the promise of the big city fails a species that was formerly nomadic, agrarian, and highly self-reliant.

THE SOLUTION therefore is akin to Conway’s Game of Life; we need a program to distill citizens who need help among citizens who are doing well.

Why don’t we have teachers, and parents making recommendations to relocate, and inter-state/federal programs for forced relocation of citizens of any age?
When a single mom recognizes her teen boy is troubled and self-isolating,
and that she’s not really qualified to handle his problems by herself,
why can’t she legally request that he be transferred to a community parenting program?
A place where people live communally (like an eco-village); they are not allowed to isolate themselves because they can’t afford to; everything is owned in common; although one can be alone it is temporary, and nothing is acquired by self, everyone is expected to help others (e.g. building shelter, growing food, etc.)
That’s where a kid like that would get help; he’d be surrounded by adults who actually had time to give two shits about him.
And he’d learn he is dependent on his societal relationships for survival, he’d learn real skills for survival, the value of his own life, and eventually to value others’ lives.

Rather than sending the citizen found in possession of marijuana to prison, send him to Colorado where it’s legal.

Rather than sending the gangster in possession of a stolen weapon to prison, give him a choice between learning to work the fields in a rural farm community, or living in a lawless place where damn near everyone has guns and is just like him and he is highly likely to be killed if he offends his neighbors.

Some people, given the choice, would prefer exile, or assisted suicide, and I think that’s ok. Let it fall under natural selection or population control.

Its like forced adoption but it includes all ages, and depending on the severity there can be situations where
a) the individual is not allowed to return to their former place (banned) for a period of time or forever, or;
b) the individual is not allowed to leave their new place for a period of time or forever

Basically its a form of open imprisonment like Israel is practicing with Gaza except less cruel because these people actually have chances to rejoin society after they have adopted a set of skills that are useful.

And for the softer crimes its more like real adoption where people who need it (children, elderly, adults down on their luck) can get the love and education they need to be successful again.

In this new justice system, imprisonment would no longer be necessary, and isolation would be split into two cases: a) mental health facilities; only for people with family in the U.S. who are still alive and still love them or where the individual has expressed a desire to live and has committed to improvement, and b) Guantanamo Bay for prisoners of war and citizen terrorists.

Notice that maximum security federal prisons would be replaced with a gladiator style death penalty or exile. The choices of exile would include missions the most dangerous places on Earth; they would be tasked with performing scientific research in Antarctica, or constructing a farm in the middle of the Sahara desert, or mining in Siberia, or eliminating hunger and malaria in politically unstable parts of Africa. Measures and milestones would be given so that if they succeeded, and they wanted to, they could rejoin society after their social debt was repaid in this manner.

And much of the justice system’s activity would not only be transparent, it would be televised in either a C-SPAN/CCTV style or a reality tv entertainment style.