I don't believe that the only solution is to make it not work. Another solution would be to make them not want or need to come, or rather, make them want to stay where they are. For a lot of illegal immigrants, coming here was the only way to keep their children out of poverty. Showing that coming here illegally doesn't always work wouldn't deter those people from trying anyway.
It really comes down to the baseline question: Why are they coming here in the first place? Is it just because they desire the better life that can be had in United States, or is it because they need that increased affluence? Looking at Mexico's economy can be decieving. While it may look like they're in great shape, there is a huge disparity between rich and poor. They're really proud of the fact that the percentage of people living in extreme poverty has gone down over the last few years (42% to 27.9% in rural areas). Here's a wake-up call to the Mexican government: That's because they've all come here! Mexican reform is necessary to putting a relative stop to illegal immigration.
Lashes are a tough sell. Maybe as a punishment for repeat offenders who commit their crimes multiple times. I still favor rehabilitation for repeat offenders, since in many cases repeated violoation of a law is caused by some form of psychosis which, with proper psychiatric attention, is curable.
To be honest, I'd prefer a more, shall we say, in depth version of community service. Working for my town's government I've dealt with people assigned community service from the courts before. A lot of them have come in expecting it to be a joke, and depending on who they get as a supervisor sometimes it is. Making it less of a joke was, in a sadistic way, rather pleasing - they weeded the Town Hall's garden and used sandpaper and spray paint to remove grafiti from one of our public parks, all in 90 degree heat. If I'd had the jurisdiction from the Town to do so I'd have had them weed out every public garden in town and scrub the sidewalks, but those types of tasks fall under the purview of Public Works, and they take forever to do anything that isn't part of their set routine, so it wasn't even worth my time to ask.
Still, there's plenty of things out there that can be done as community service that are quite ardent and visible. I'm not talking about walking around with a bag and one of those spear things picking up garbage off the side of the road, I'm talking about washing every one of the local courthouse's windows to a shine or mowing the town football field's lawn. These are highly visible actions - people in the community going about their daily business see them at it and, if the supervisor is doing his job properly, understand that it is a punishment, it is not easy, and it is certainly not desirable.
I wasn't suggesting longer sentences for people who are trying to get back into prison. I think stocks would make an ironic punishment for something like that.
I haven't really researched it either. Looks generally like federal prison populations have been going down while state prison populations have been going up. Still, the report I'm looking at is a little out of date, shows heavy fluctuation in growth trends from year to year, and doesn't show enough data back through the years (a 2006 report, the graph only extends back to 2000) to give a very firm idea of how federal and state prison populations have been changing. Still, in a highly localized sense, over the last few years federal prison populations have been decreasing while state prison populations have been increasing.
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/p06.pdf
It almost certainly would drop. You're right about that.
I think I've read that article too, actually. Somewhere down in the Southwest? Prison commandant said something how if our troops in Iraq can deal with hundred degree weather in full gear the inmates should have to deal with the same? Probably a different article but I'd imagine the idea remains the same.
Making prisons harsh as a deterrent works. I like the idea of making people understand that going to prison does not equate to getting taken care of too, though. Make them compete for better jobs inside the prison (working the library has to be preferable to the laundry or waste management). A lot of prisons require work, but it must be understood that they work in order to eat. Prisons shouldn't look like Communist blocs, where the mentality is, "They're going to feed me, and oh yeah, I might have to do some work."
I'm not totally sure of how to bring off that idealistic change, but I think it'd kill anyone's notions of wanting to go to prison to get taken care of. It'd be helpful for the inmates, too, in that being a part of a capitalist-style society while in prison would make it easier to assimilate back into our own capitalist society once they're out.
The more I think about it the more I like the idea.
