“The US prison system is an overstuffed, rotting piece of work that makes its investors rich and its tenants embittered. The typical American reaction to such a sentiment is knee-jerky and righteous: He who doesn’t want to be imprisoned shouldn’t commit a crime in the first place.
“Well, duh. But that doesn’t excuse the architects of the prison industrial complex — they, the sinless stone-casters — from doing their best to design a responsible and humane system. Which is currently not their MO.”