We Must Run This Program At A Loss

Hoo, boy. The commenters at Jim Henley's blog aren't too happy with my suggestion that it's inconsistent to believe the current administration is turning our country into a fascist dictatorship and simultaneously believe that agents of the government should have carte blanche in deciding who does and does not get to own a gun.

On the bright side, they're a little more tolerant of the post I wrote condemning the government's new proposal to let prisoners be used in medical experiments.

Punishing wrongdoers is the one area of government that should always run at a financial loss. Why? Because the power to do so must be used sparingly, only when absolutely necessary. And the only social problem prisons should solve is the problem of dangerous, harmful people running loose on the streets — not a lack of medical-test subjects, farm labor or anything else.

In all seriousness: I've been distracted these past several months. Between my new job, excitement over Lieberman's losing the primary here in Connecticut, and news stories about the Supreme Court slapping down some of Bush's more odious proposals, I completely forgot how terrified I've been over the direction in which our country seems to be heading. Lucky for me that this past weekend, with its stories of liquid bans on airplanes, warrantless bag searches on New York subways and the proposal to turn our oversized prison population into an experimental tool has reminded me how closely optimism and self-delusion are related these days.