Pubdate: Tue, 10 Sep 2013 Source: Times-Tribune, The (Scranton PA) Copyright: 2013 Townnews.com Contact: http://www.thetimes-tribune.com Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4440 Author: Stephen George Bettum PRISON SLAVES Editor: Is there hidden slavery in the United States? There is a never-ending war on drugs, a seriously broken justice system, and laws that are not equally enforced. Many states have mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenders and three-strike laws. Some states' prison systems can add time to a prisoner's sentence for minor infractions without a trial. These for-profit prison systems are running prisons for a fee and then getting the use of free prison labor to manufacture products for industries that then compete with regular businesses. How many jobs is this costing the regular American public? Haven't there been enough prisoners and police officers lost in the pointless drug wars and in our prisons? Do we really want our police to die protecting a few for-profit corporations? How can we talk to other countries about their slavery problems when we have prison slaves? Hasn't there been enough slavery? STEPHEN GEORGE BETTUM SCRANTON - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom