What happens when you get locked up for something you *might* do in the future? Can you ever get out? @typeinvestigate @LipmanCenterCJS https://t.co/iSM33cxXKE

Jordan Michael Smith (@WriterJMS) in Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, for his review of Three Worlds: Memoirs of an Arab-Jew by Avi Shlaim

Side issue but it irks me when people say Churchill or Great Britain saved Western civ. Nazi Germany was as much a part of 'the West' as England. Some people equate Western civ with freedom or liberalism but genocide and totalitarianism are equally part of Western history.

Reporter @WriterJMS investigates how top universities provide deplorably subpar healthcare to incarcerated populations while misusing public funds. For EHRP + @chronicle: https://t.co/z0640Gx675

“But Mick cannot forget what she saw at Larned. She believes that people like her former patients deserve an honest chance at rehabilitation, and she will keep fighting for their rights and dignity, no matter how unpopular this cause may be.” —@WriterJMS https://t.co/THzpbGXJcm

“The pretension to treatment there was a ‘façade,’ she wrote, and the SPTP ­effectively a ‘shadow prison masking as a treatment facility. . . .’” —@WriterJMS https://t.co/THzpbGXJcm

North America is not normal.

I have heard that the SPTP is confiscating copies of this story from its residents and reprimanding them for having it. The Kansas ACLU has been contacted for their assistance.

“She came to believe that the SPTP would never release most of these people, no matter how eagerly they participated in treatment and kept up good behavior; her job wasn’t to treat these patients but to perpetuate the illusion of treatment.” —@WriterJMS https://t.co/THzpbGXJcm

“Out of sight, out of mind: this is the attitude most people seemed to have about those in civil commitment, no matter the human cost.” —Jordan Michael Smith (@WriterJMS) https://t.co/THzpbGXJcm

“Although he committed his only crimes as a juvenile more than twenty-­five years ago, Merryfield, now in his mid-­forties, is still at Larned, with no release in sight.” —Jordan Michael Smith (@WriterJMS) https://t.co/THzpbGXJcm

“For Mick, the residents were simply people in need of care. They had committed crimes, but they had completed their sentences. ‘No human being is beyond redemption,’ she told me.” @WriterJMS reports on civil commitment programs for sex offenders. https://t.co/THzpbGXJcm

Please consider this for your weekend reading!

ICYMI:

My @chronicle investigation reveals that some top universities are providing health care to prison inmates. In some cases, they have established consulting arms that rake in lucrative contract fees while providing subpar care to inmates. @econhardship https://t.co/bcQJvcAPVF

My latest investigation: Fossil Fuel Interests Are Working to Kill Solar in One Ohio County. The Hometown Newspaper Is Helping. W/ @jsmithrichards & @acookiecrumbles https://t.co/uDZhzBSMZ8

One of Toronto's newest park is built on a former giant mound of trash

As colleges and universities reopen, we should ask what the pro-Palestine protests achieved—and what’s in store for the fall. From @WriterJMS:

The demonization of other countries and peoples, the inability to understand the worldview of challengers and adversaries, the overreliance on force: these traits remain, because they were ingrained in Washington long before 9/11. From @WriterJMS in 2021:

Not a band to be outdone, Spinal Tap is demanding that the Trump campaign refrain from playing “Sex Farm” at their rallies.