Market capitalism is getting the blame for things that have nothing to do with it. Several examples will make my point.
Several years ago, two judges in Northeast Pennsylvania (Democrats, in case you’re curious; I’m telling you because the Associated Press won’t) put together a kickback arrangement with the owner of two area juvenile detention centers to refer youths brought up on even the most trivial of charges to those facilities instead of prescribing probation, community service, or other less stringent sentences. The now-former judges, Mark Ciavarella Jr. and Michael Conahan, collected $2.8 million over the course of the “enterprise.” The former owner of the detention centers has already pleaded guilty, and the two recalcitrant judges were recently indicted after their plea-bargaining sincerity failed to impress the case’s judge.
Thousands of kids who made minor mistakes (one teenage girl’s crime supposedly warranting detention was “making fun of her school’s vice principal on a Myspace page”) are scarred for life, and it’s likely that more than a few have become career criminals, something that would never have happened if the judges had not hatched their outrageous scheme.
See full Article.
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