US incarceration rate

Yeah, it seems like a safe bet that we've got too many people in jail, and probably a ridiculous number of them are in there for marijuana and the like.

But I'm continually amazed by people who quote official statistics from places like the PRC as if they were unquestionably true. I recently saw somebody quoting Cuba's official incarceration figure as if it were gospel. After the Cold War, we found that eastern bloc statistics of all kinds -- absolute gospel to the left, for decades -- weren't merely fudged a bit; they were outright fantasy.

I've never had a very high opinion of Lew Rockwell, and it hasn't improved. Usually, though, you figure you can at least rely on libertarians not to trust dictatorships quite so blindly. I mean, given that libertarians are supposed to have the (laudable) habit of distrusting governments, what it is it about the rulers of the PRC that strikes Rockwell as uniquely trustworthy?

Not to belabor the obvious, but the PRC as a whole bears a pretty close resemblance to a US prison, doesn't it?

From my law school experience and practice, I can safely say that our justice system needs repair. However, Mr. Rockwell ignores the fact that it is as much (if not more so) the lack of punishment early in a juvenile career that tends to lead to incarceration. For example, I had two criminal law professors in school of the liberal stripe. Both said in their experience that over 90% of the defendants were guilty of their accused crime (one said 90%, the other, a federal public defender, said IIRC 95%). The individuals that were guilty had a rap sheet (or sheet) and the innocent tended not to. It is my belief that if we punish somewhat harshly early, we solve problems later. (BTW, the other professor was Irene Rosenberg, who I have a lot of respect for even if I disagree with her on many issues.)