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Why is Senator Jim Webb the only national figure focused on the prison economy?

By Douglas A. Berman

I find it so very exciting that Senator Jim Webb continue to question the US incarceration rate and to explore the economic consequences of mass incarceration and criminal justice drug policies.  Senator Webb's congressional hearing on these topics this week is nicely reviewed in this Nation piece, and it ends with an encouraging report that Senator Webb is just getting revved up:With this hearing, Senator Webb continues to lead a much overdue Congressional reaction to the US's failing drug policy. Indeed two colleagues on the committee, Senator Amy Klobuchar and Representative Maurice Hinchey praised Senator Webb for his "courage." And don't expect the Senator to back off any time soon.  His press secretary, Kimberly Hunter, e-mailed me following the hearing, "Senator Webb has been interested in the US incarceration rate and drug policies since he was a journalist studying the Japanese prison system in 1984...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on June 21, 2008 (boomark / email).