PMT: What's shaking in Wisconsin?



For some reason, I seem to be considered an expert mostly in Wisconsin and Canada. And that is ok with me-- I love both of those places.

Yesterday, I got up at 6 to do an early-morning show (not surprisingly, "The Morning Show") on Wisconsin Public Radio. The topic was incarceration, and you can hear the whole thing here (I appear in the 6:30-7 slot).

Wisconsin is fascinating because it is transitioning from a retributivist governor (Scott Walker) to one who seems fairly progressive on criminal law issues. Gov. Evers seems committed to doing some decent things, including:

-- increasing pay for correctional officers in order to raise hiring standards and fill vacancies
-- close an ancient prison in Green Bay without replacing it (hopefully, making this work through reduced incarceration throughout the state)
-- Move away from one giant (and very troubled) youth facility in a remote area to several that are closer to population centers
-- Reconstituting the clemency process that Walker destroyed

All these are difficult things to do. But it is great that there is hope...

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Barr Report on the Mueller Report

Megan Willome wrote a nice little haiku about the Mueller report yesterday: Dear Mr. Mueller, You could've summarized the whole in a haiku. She's right, too. I've got some thoughts on the Mueller Report (in addition to what I have said here  and here ): 1)  Regarding a conspiracy with Russians to influence the election, it seems clear that Mueller found insufficient evidence to recommend charges or impeachment. That's not totally surprising. From what we already knew, it seems that events like the Trump Tower meeting the Russians approached people in the Trump organization, talked about some stuff, but the Trump people never agreed to participate in the activity in any active way-- and that agreement is the essence of conspiracy. Sure, it turns out that the Russians went and did stuff to help Trump on their own, but that does not make it a conspiracy. 2) On obstruction, there is the legitimate question of "obstructing what?" I may disagree with the Barr analy
Read more

A Cart for America's Drunkest Golfer

Image
I'm not a huge golf fan. I think the use of land for golf courses in some places (ie, Los Angeles) is pretty ridiculous, and it drives me bananas to see it on TV, with the whispering announcers and tracking shots of a tiny white ball someplace against a herky-jerky sky. Still, I have to admit that it does have some fascinating personalities floating around. For the last three decades one of them has been John Daly, who was just approved to ride a cart for the PGA Championship, drawing a rebuke from Tiger Woods, who recalled that he walked the course (and won that tournament) on a broken leg. Daly has a variety of ailments that make walking difficult, and I don't begrudge him the cart (though, again, I don't know much about this sport and its traditions, so I probably should not have an opinion at all). Daly is a character: probably the only pro golfer to be arrested for public drunkenness in the parking lot of a Hooter's restaurant, he claims to have lost over $50,000,0
Read more