Today, President Obama is being lauded by the press, just like every other day. He’s receiving the praise this time for being the first-ever sitting president to visit a federal prison. Yet another momentous achievement in our nation’s history. How many other first-evers will he achieve before he leaves office? We can only guess. Eleventy-googolplex, perhaps.
Anyway, so Obama went to El Reno Federal Correctional Institution in Oklahoma, looked at what a prison cell looks like, and he met with six of the incarcerated–non-violent drug offenders, according to reports–with a film crew in tow for an HBO documentary.
The president emerged from this meeting telling journalists,
“When they describe their youth and their childhood, these are young people who made mistakes that aren’t that different from the mistakes I made and the mistakes that a lot of you guys made,” Mr. Obama told reporters afterward. “The difference is, they did not have the kind of support structures, the second chances, the resources that would allow them to survive those mistakes.”
He added that “we have a tendency sometimes to take for granted or think it’s normal” that so many young people have been locked up for drug crimes. “It’s not normal,” he said. “It’s not what happens in other countries. What is normal is teenagers doing stupid things. What is normal is young people who make mistakes.”
If they had the same advantages he and others have had, Mr. Obama added, they “could be thriving in the way we are.”
I have to agree with Obama on some level that perhaps some offenders are incarcerated for longer than they need to be. I’m not a believer in extensive prison time for minor drug offenses. However, if these prisoners are repeat offenders, it’s obvious that they didn’t learn their lessons the first or second times they got caught. The first time they get caught, okay, I screwed up, I won’t do it again. The second time, aw, shoot, they got me again, they’re serious about the laws. But how many times can one be excused for making the same mistake three, four, six, ten times?
People can turn their lives around if they make the effort, if they want to bad enough. If they won’t make the effort, they will continue to get into trouble with the law inordinately in comparison to the rest of the civilian population. Having the freedoms we do in America often makes people be free to be stupid, and that’s what gets them into trouble.
Yet Politico notes that the president said this:
On a visit to a federal prison in Oklahoma, the president says he believes social disparities mean some youth go to the principal’s office while others go to jail.
I found that part interesting. He continues to blame society instead of trying to use this as an opportunity to tell our troubled youth to do the right thing and to stay out of trouble.
You know what else was interesting? We’ve heard this before. Back in January of 2014, the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice teamed for an initiative to improve school discipline and “enhance school climate.” Like the effort Obama’s making here to lighten sentencing, his DOJ and DOE were working to “create positive, safe environments” in schools where “students of color and with disabilities are disproportionately impacted.”
DOE Secretary Arne Duncan said, “Positive discipline policies can help create safer learning environments without relying heavily on suspensions and expulsions. Schools also must understand their civil rights obligations and avoid unfair disciplinary practices.”
Attorney General Eric Holder said, “A routine school disciplinary infraction should land a student in the principal’s office, not in a police precinct.”
And now we’re hearing the exact same refrain from President Obama.
This talk is the kind of talk that keeps us divided–trying to make one party feel guilty for not being punished as much as another party and thinking the solution is to treat problems with kid gloves.
No. Discipline isn’t meant to be positive. Discipline is supposed to show that there are consequences to your actions. This “positive discipline” train of thought may feel good to the people who came up with the idea, but it feels even better for the young people who find out about it and will be tempted to push even more buttons now, knowing they’ll be able to get away with it. The Administration’s solution will create even more problems, thereby having the opposite effect of its claims.
The Administration makes suspension and expulsion sound cruel by labeling it “exclusionary discipline.” So I guess that’s the same mindset they’re using for punishing people who have committed crimes, too. Let’s give lawbreakers more “positive punishment.” That’ll solve our crime problems.
At best, this philosophy is simply misguided thinking. But it is flawed. You can’t reinvent the wheel, no matter how lofty your expectations and pure your intentions are.
Then again, he probably knows what he says keeps our nation divided. From calling violent thugs his imaginary sons to thinking that the solution to terrorism is to start a jobs program to focusing on disparity instead of responsibility, it sure seems as though Obama cares more about making the guilty feel like victims than he does about making the innocent feel protected.
