I'm against crime. Why aren't judges?

Some things about me have certainly changed over time. I've become a calmer person thanks largely to my wife. I've lost all my homophobia and most of my racism. I still have a materialistic streak, but it's much more easily held in check than it once was.
One place my attitudes have not changed, and likely will never change, is towards crime and punishment. I'm unabashedly right-wing in my theories on both, and nothing I've seen through my limited time on earth has done anything to shake my convictions in the slightest.
Eva's done wonders for my perceptions, broadening my mind in countless ways, admitting shades of gray into a black/white world. But my thoughts about crime and criminals long predate my wife. Liberal types would call them antediluvian; also, probably, barbaric. That's fine. Barbaric simply means 'strange, foreign', and it's been ages since I thought I was anything else.
Every time I hear people gibbering about the "root causes" of crime, I just want to reach out and shake them by their root causes.
The "root causes" of crime are assumed to be poverty, an adverse social environment, and dysfunctional family conditions. It is my contention that all of these things, to varying degrees, are simply excuses, and not even good ones.

Poverty

We don't often see abject poverty here in Canada, whatever the NDP may believe. One place it does show up is in the homeless populations of our larger cities. This is a group of people who survive, by and large, on the handouts of strangers. But the vast majority of homeless people are not criminals. When's the last time you heard about some squeegee kid robbing a bank? Or stabbing a Bay St. businesswoman and making off with her purse? Those who are addicted to illicit substances do tend towards petty thievery in order to support their habit, but being poor in and of itself has almost nothing to do with being a criminal. To suggest otherwise is to impugn the vast majority of the poor, who are hard-working and law-abiding. In fact, most of the high-profile juvenile criminal cases over the past decade concern people who are at least middle class, if not higher.

An adverse social environment/dysfunctional family conditions

As a child, I watched a nasty divorce unfold around me. I was physically punished on innumerable occasions from age three to eight or so, something which is now considered child abuse. I'd forgive my mom for all of it...if there was anything to forgive. Fact is, the spanking stick was the only thing I listened to, most of the time, and I've never once laid blame at her or anyone else's feet.
I'm far from the only kid who grew up in less-than-ideal circumstances. Read any memoirs lately? The best one I've ever read is the trilogy by Frank McCourt that begins with Angela's Ashes. Now here is poverty on an elemental level. Also an alcoholic and abusive father, a ghetto which is an Irish version of inner-city Detroit (or Vancouver's Downtown Eastside), prejudice galore, and despair by the bucketful. My childhood was purest Elysian fields in comparison.
Far from evolving into a career criminal, McCourt became a teacher, a shaper of young minds, by all accounts a damned good one. And I'd argue his respectability is the rule, rather than the exception, for those who've been deprived.
Because each act, including each criminal act, is a choice. By all means, you might be predisposed to criminality if, for example, your parents were felons and you never learned another way to live your life, or again if you were born without empathy, a true sociopath. But such people are (thankfully) rare.
By no means am I suggesting we should leave the poor be. There are many reasons to offer a hand up out of poverty that have nothing to do with a supposed inclination toward crime and everything to do with basic human dignity.

Ask your average juvenile deliquent about the root causes of his/her crime and you'll usually hear something like "because I felt like it, asshole!" That's it: no need to dig deeper.

So given my attitudes on crime, what do I think of Harper's "reverse onus" announcement?

For those who missed it, persons previously convicted of a gun crime, on arrest for another, will now have to prove why they should recieve bail. And I say, well, duh. Given the number of criminals charged with crimes committed while they're out on bail from commission of other crimes, this is a no-brainer. But it's only a tiny baby step towards a justice system in this country. In fact, it may be utterly meaningless.
It often seems like judges have been appointed based on how much they LOVE criminals. I literally get sick to my stomach every time I read about the drunk driver facing his 78th conviction, or the street thug smirking in court because he knows he'll be back running with his posse by supper.
The headline in the Kitchener-Waterloo Record the other day piqued my interest: "Judge Explains Aversion to Prison". Finally, I thought. So I read the story. Guess what the explanation was? "An enlightened civilization should be moving away from imprisonment".
Yeah. Okay. An enlightened individual should be moving away from assaulting people and stealing their property, but you never hear a judge say anything like that, do you?

Following are some of my ideas towards the justice system we do not currently have in Canada. Some of them are a tad harsh--cruel and unusual punishment, you might say--but then, murdering people is cruel and unusual, by my lights.

1) BRING BACK CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. This would be for killers of the Paul Bernardo ilk, guilty to the nth degree, and proud of their crimes. Get rid of 'em. It costs the Canadian taxpayer millions to keep people like Bernardo and Clifford Olsen locked up. Besides, so long as they're alive, it's always possible some judge might think they deserve a second chance. That's not a chance I want to take.
There are two chief arguments against capital punishment: one, it's inhumane; two, it's not much of a deterrent. Inhumane, they say. Death by lethal injection is painless if it's done right...same with the electric chair. Compare that with the pain rapists and murderers have inflicted on their victims. Inhumane my ass.
As for deterrence, I'll grant you that the death penalty hasn't done much to lower the crime rate. There's an easy fix for that, though: one trial, one quick appeal (no more than a week apart), then, if guilty both times, immediate execution. None of this "fifteen years on death row" business.
Besides, while the death penalty may not deter crime, it does a bang-up job lowering the recidivism rate. Dead men don't re-offend. Simple as that.
2) MAKE LIFE MEAN LIFE. As in "the period before death." Corollary: insist that all convicted felons serve their full sentences. No more weekends counting for double time served. No more time off for good behaviour--if your behaviour was that good you wouldn't be in prison, now, would you? After your sentence has been served in full, you're free to go...but conditions will be placed on you and you'll be expected to obey them.

Ken, this would mean many new prisons and a huge cost! Perhaps, but there are ways around that, too:

3) There's a whole lot of frozen tundra wasteland up north where we could deposit people, hundreds of miles from nowhere. Prison Survivor! Best of luck to you, buddy. Think that's really nasty? So do I. Guess you should have thought about that before you offed your wife.

Or

4) BRING BACK CHAIN GANGS. Driven our highways lately? The detritus of our throwaway society is everywhere, and unionized employees demand thirty bucks an hour to clean it up. I say prisoners should be doing this work, at a fraction of the cost.

5) THE END OF 'CLUB FED'. No pizza parties, no fashion shows. No television, unless it's tuned to the Disney channel or something like it. Libraries, certainly: in fact, I'd insist on an educational curriculum for all prisoners, based on their abilities. But for the love of Pete, NO INTERNET ACCESS.

Two other ideas:

6) Get rid of "attempted murder" charges. You tried to kill somebody; you shouldn't be rewarded for having failed.

7) NO MORE PLEA BARGAINS. Full stop.

And that's all I have to say about that. You may pity the poor murderer in my world if you want. I don't.