In this week’s episode, Glenn is joined by Charles Fain Lehman, fellow at the Manhattan Institute and contributing editor at City Journal. The two discuss the effects of progressive criminal justice initiatives like bail reform and discovery reform.
Regarding hate crimes. He says that a victim of a hate crime suffers more. I'm not convinced. To be attacked for your race is at least an acknowledgement of your humanity. To be attacked for the money in your wallet is complete dehumanizing -- the victim is a *thing*, not even worthy of hate.
Of course, hate crimes make the targeted group feel less safe.
Plus there are plenty of reasons to hate someone for reason other than race/ethnicity, etc. to me the whole idea of tolerance is to be able treat someone you hate with kindness and respect, so that someone you dislike actually thinks you like them. I think St Teresa of the Child Jesus treated a fellow nun who had authority over her so well, the nun was convinced that she was well liked by the future saint. After St Teresa died, and her sister nuns saw her diary or spiritual journal, it turned out St Teresa could not stand her. (I learned this from my daughters, one of whom completely adored Saint Teresa when she was a young teenager. So I hope I have not made a mistake.)
Switching people from one set of addictive drugs to others and calling that treatment is horrifying as a solution and rather simpleminded. Methadone a very addictive substance and a morphine derivative comes to mind.More a rhetorical bait and switch than anything else.
1) Taking a dose of a known substance is not the same thing as shooting up on street drugs. It is much safer by default. Getting people on a safe, legal medication can keep them in rehab or in therapy, or they can simply age out of their criminal behavior after some time on MAT (as Lehman points out, criminality tends to decline with age).
2) Of the three MAT medications, methadone is strong and is certainly addictive, but less so than fentanyl or heroin. Suboxone (buprenorphone) is a weak opioid with much less of a high. Naltrexone is an opioid blocker and is not an addictive drug at all.
3) People abuse drugs for a reason. Those with chronic pain may actually need a pain medication. It is common to put people on methadone for severe end of life pain, and we also use buprenorphone for chronic pain as it is much safer than other opioids. Opioids have a legitimate medical use, and particularly when services were shut down due to restrictions in the early COVID era, many patients with real pain turned to the illegal drug market. They might simply need to get back on legal medications.
Heroine maintenance works just as well and of course methadone (whether it's more or less addictive is not so clear) is often on the black market and results in deaths. I am objecting to calling a preferred officially marketed addictive drug as treatment while one that is not on the accepted economic market (deemed illegal) is demonized. Perhaps the real policy issue is why so much unhappiness is extant in our society that leads so many to seek escape.
So we probably have some degree of overlap, because I do run into this issue. I think that methadone and buprenorphine have properties which give them significant advantages in addiction treatment, but I still find that there are circumstances where it’s useful to prescribe other opioid medications, particularly for patients who are in pain. I would agree that the carveout for a couple of medications as MAT is an irrational regulatory decision.
And I would also agree that the “deaths of despair” paradigm is more informative than looking at things in terms of the pharmacology of any one specific drug of abuse. The despair that leads people into drug use is more of an issue than the drugs themselves. I use this particular term because I watched the authors of the deaths of despair book present to an audience of opioid experts at NIH, one of whom took the mic to sneer at them and ask why anyone should bother concerning themselves with the deaths of white men.
Glad to hear that you as I am is concerned by the state of our country which creates so much unhappiness with its divisive politics and lack of care about those who have fewer means to create safety nets to provide soft landings.
On gambling- nobody in my childhood household gambled nor did they know anyone who gambled. I never did. After one class of statistics, I doubt that few if any exiting students would gamble.
On drug use, do not involve my public health profession - all rotten apples. I am curious to know if all realms of high-tech can assist capture of drug shipments before arrival at the market. If AI knows what I would like to purchase, can AI also know who is likely to be involved in drug transport?
[Time 38:00]; Public sector unions. I belonged to the IT union for 22 years (Local 21). When DEI arrived, the first thing the union did was to get into bed with DEI directors, (not literally). When my department created a vague rule in 2020 (The Hepworth rule) that duct-taped 7,750 employees’ mouths at home, my union did nothing. When employees were censored and denied due process because of DEI, union did nothing.
Lehman sounds well-studied in many areas of criminal justice process, cop retention and city-gov policy. I worry about DEI moving under the radar by going into sleeper-cell mode and then waking-up to execute another nation-wide sabotage of city-gov. The 2020 nightmare known as George Floyd protests/riots would not have occurred in SF if employees such as myself had not had our mouths illegally duct-taped by DEI from day 01 of 2018 DEI implementation.
Glenn is still recovering—this conversation was recorded back in March. It's still going to be a little while before he's cleared to record new episodes.
Which were largely unnecessary and we now know worse for society than the disease. Some of us suspected this as they were enacted and we were ultimately proven correct.
Yes I too would like a change towards accurate language on this. I’m very deliberate about it in how I speak. Blaming it all on a virus removes a whole chain of causality and decision making starting with Anthony Fauci bypassing American law to fund gain of function research in China. Etc. Many issues of our day could benefit from similar changes but that’s too long for this comment.
Narcan was the best and worst thing to happen. Without it, there would be a lot less chronic users but more cops and others dying from accidental exposure. Talk to EMT's, they narcan the same people over and over. And they are pissed that you ruined their high.
To a great extent, Narcan is the answer to fentanyl. It used to be that even people with a serious addiction could usually survive without overdosing and accidental overdoses weren't that common, but fentanyl is so potent and illegal drugs are so hard to dose, and fentanyl is now often a contaminant in other drugs. All of this leads to accidental fentanyl overdoses being very common.
That is to say, it's not so much that human nature is worse than it was 30 years ago, it's that the drug supply itself is more dangerous, which I think accounts for most of the increase in deaths they talk about. So we need a medical response to that.
Regarding the question of young men who are immigrants, there is Greek text used in the UK years ago to teach Greek to young men about a Greek army of mercenaries hired to overthrow the emperor of Persia. The first battle was in what is now the middle of Turkey. The Persian who hired them (the emperor’s nephew) was killed in the first battle and the book describes the attempt of the mercenaries to get back to Greece. When they heroically managed to get back to the strait of Bosporus the Greeks did not want to allow them to cross because no Greek city wanted to allow 5,000 unpaired young men with combat experience to enter their gate.
My wife and I were the victims of a break in and trashing of our home. The fear my wife has because the perpetrator is out on her own recognizance is unmeasurable. It has destroyed her life and therefore greatly damaged mine. I am sure we are not the only ones whose lives are destroyed by what prosecutors consider a minor felony and the lack of knowledge about how being a crime victim affects people among those who want to reform criminal justice is beyond me.
Thanks for the story, that’s a sad window into what that experience is like. I can only imagine the more vulnerable like older people, women and children have a harder time with this fear. “Luxury beliefs” has become a mantra for me for many of these issues. In this case the legislators have homes in the nicest neighborhoods, private security, etc. This seems like a fundamental flaw in our system, when people don’t face the consequences of their policies.
The neglect of safety for crime victims is unconscionable and based on ignorance of human nature.
Since you can't change the situation at the moment I do recommend you do all you can to mitigate its effects on you.
a) Carry pepper spray. Buy as many as you need and check to make sure you have it each time you go out the door. I keep it in the same pocket at all times and if the situation appears sketchy I've got the safety thumbed off and ready to use.
If you've ever been on the receiving end of this crap you know it's going to deter nearly anybody, though on a windy area it's problematic.
I prefer the ones that shoot a stream or gel.
b) Take a self-defense awareness class or even just watch YouTube videos on the subject. These can increase your sense of safety by reminding you that you can exercise some agency in keeping safe.
c) I suppose if the problem is going to persist long range you need to buy and carry a gun, train sufficiently and become very up on the laws regarding their usage in your area so you don't end up in jail for your legitimate use of same.
We do need to elect people who realize that people are entitled to be safe from crime and these supposedly well intended pro-criminal ideas are not fair to law abiding people.
Regarding hate crimes. He says that a victim of a hate crime suffers more. I'm not convinced. To be attacked for your race is at least an acknowledgement of your humanity. To be attacked for the money in your wallet is complete dehumanizing -- the victim is a *thing*, not even worthy of hate.
Of course, hate crimes make the targeted group feel less safe.
Non-hate crimes make everyone feel less safe.
Plus there are plenty of reasons to hate someone for reason other than race/ethnicity, etc. to me the whole idea of tolerance is to be able treat someone you hate with kindness and respect, so that someone you dislike actually thinks you like them. I think St Teresa of the Child Jesus treated a fellow nun who had authority over her so well, the nun was convinced that she was well liked by the future saint. After St Teresa died, and her sister nuns saw her diary or spiritual journal, it turned out St Teresa could not stand her. (I learned this from my daughters, one of whom completely adored Saint Teresa when she was a young teenager. So I hope I have not made a mistake.)
Switching people from one set of addictive drugs to others and calling that treatment is horrifying as a solution and rather simpleminded. Methadone a very addictive substance and a morphine derivative comes to mind.More a rhetorical bait and switch than anything else.
Several issues with this:
1) Taking a dose of a known substance is not the same thing as shooting up on street drugs. It is much safer by default. Getting people on a safe, legal medication can keep them in rehab or in therapy, or they can simply age out of their criminal behavior after some time on MAT (as Lehman points out, criminality tends to decline with age).
2) Of the three MAT medications, methadone is strong and is certainly addictive, but less so than fentanyl or heroin. Suboxone (buprenorphone) is a weak opioid with much less of a high. Naltrexone is an opioid blocker and is not an addictive drug at all.
3) People abuse drugs for a reason. Those with chronic pain may actually need a pain medication. It is common to put people on methadone for severe end of life pain, and we also use buprenorphone for chronic pain as it is much safer than other opioids. Opioids have a legitimate medical use, and particularly when services were shut down due to restrictions in the early COVID era, many patients with real pain turned to the illegal drug market. They might simply need to get back on legal medications.
Heroine maintenance works just as well and of course methadone (whether it's more or less addictive is not so clear) is often on the black market and results in deaths. I am objecting to calling a preferred officially marketed addictive drug as treatment while one that is not on the accepted economic market (deemed illegal) is demonized. Perhaps the real policy issue is why so much unhappiness is extant in our society that leads so many to seek escape.
So we probably have some degree of overlap, because I do run into this issue. I think that methadone and buprenorphine have properties which give them significant advantages in addiction treatment, but I still find that there are circumstances where it’s useful to prescribe other opioid medications, particularly for patients who are in pain. I would agree that the carveout for a couple of medications as MAT is an irrational regulatory decision.
And I would also agree that the “deaths of despair” paradigm is more informative than looking at things in terms of the pharmacology of any one specific drug of abuse. The despair that leads people into drug use is more of an issue than the drugs themselves. I use this particular term because I watched the authors of the deaths of despair book present to an audience of opioid experts at NIH, one of whom took the mic to sneer at them and ask why anyone should bother concerning themselves with the deaths of white men.
Glad to hear that you as I am is concerned by the state of our country which creates so much unhappiness with its divisive politics and lack of care about those who have fewer means to create safety nets to provide soft landings.
On gambling- nobody in my childhood household gambled nor did they know anyone who gambled. I never did. After one class of statistics, I doubt that few if any exiting students would gamble.
On drug use, do not involve my public health profession - all rotten apples. I am curious to know if all realms of high-tech can assist capture of drug shipments before arrival at the market. If AI knows what I would like to purchase, can AI also know who is likely to be involved in drug transport?
[Time 38:00]; Public sector unions. I belonged to the IT union for 22 years (Local 21). When DEI arrived, the first thing the union did was to get into bed with DEI directors, (not literally). When my department created a vague rule in 2020 (The Hepworth rule) that duct-taped 7,750 employees’ mouths at home, my union did nothing. When employees were censored and denied due process because of DEI, union did nothing.
Lehman sounds well-studied in many areas of criminal justice process, cop retention and city-gov policy. I worry about DEI moving under the radar by going into sleeper-cell mode and then waking-up to execute another nation-wide sabotage of city-gov. The 2020 nightmare known as George Floyd protests/riots would not have occurred in SF if employees such as myself had not had our mouths illegally duct-taped by DEI from day 01 of 2018 DEI implementation.
(Sorry if this is misplaced/timed, but: ) Welcome back Glenn! We're all glad your surgery apparently went well, and you are back at it!
Glenn is still recovering—this conversation was recorded back in March. It's still going to be a little while before he's cleared to record new episodes.
Thanks for Glenn info, I was ready to scold him for returning so soon.
Thank you for the follow-up, Mark. I hope we see Glenn back at it soon!
“Because of Covid.”
Nope.
Because of Lockdowns.
Which were largely unnecessary and we now know worse for society than the disease. Some of us suspected this as they were enacted and we were ultimately proven correct.
Yes I too would like a change towards accurate language on this. I’m very deliberate about it in how I speak. Blaming it all on a virus removes a whole chain of causality and decision making starting with Anthony Fauci bypassing American law to fund gain of function research in China. Etc. Many issues of our day could benefit from similar changes but that’s too long for this comment.
Spot on.
Narcan was the best and worst thing to happen. Without it, there would be a lot less chronic users but more cops and others dying from accidental exposure. Talk to EMT's, they narcan the same people over and over. And they are pissed that you ruined their high.
To a great extent, Narcan is the answer to fentanyl. It used to be that even people with a serious addiction could usually survive without overdosing and accidental overdoses weren't that common, but fentanyl is so potent and illegal drugs are so hard to dose, and fentanyl is now often a contaminant in other drugs. All of this leads to accidental fentanyl overdoses being very common.
That is to say, it's not so much that human nature is worse than it was 30 years ago, it's that the drug supply itself is more dangerous, which I think accounts for most of the increase in deaths they talk about. So we need a medical response to that.
You call me out my name!
Regarding the question of young men who are immigrants, there is Greek text used in the UK years ago to teach Greek to young men about a Greek army of mercenaries hired to overthrow the emperor of Persia. The first battle was in what is now the middle of Turkey. The Persian who hired them (the emperor’s nephew) was killed in the first battle and the book describes the attempt of the mercenaries to get back to Greece. When they heroically managed to get back to the strait of Bosporus the Greeks did not want to allow them to cross because no Greek city wanted to allow 5,000 unpaired young men with combat experience to enter their gate.
Mr Lehman uses diminishing marginal returns incorrectly. He should have said marginal returns begin to diminish more rapidly.
My wife and I were the victims of a break in and trashing of our home. The fear my wife has because the perpetrator is out on her own recognizance is unmeasurable. It has destroyed her life and therefore greatly damaged mine. I am sure we are not the only ones whose lives are destroyed by what prosecutors consider a minor felony and the lack of knowledge about how being a crime victim affects people among those who want to reform criminal justice is beyond me.
Thanks for the story, that’s a sad window into what that experience is like. I can only imagine the more vulnerable like older people, women and children have a harder time with this fear. “Luxury beliefs” has become a mantra for me for many of these issues. In this case the legislators have homes in the nicest neighborhoods, private security, etc. This seems like a fundamental flaw in our system, when people don’t face the consequences of their policies.
The neglect of safety for crime victims is unconscionable and based on ignorance of human nature.
Since you can't change the situation at the moment I do recommend you do all you can to mitigate its effects on you.
a) Carry pepper spray. Buy as many as you need and check to make sure you have it each time you go out the door. I keep it in the same pocket at all times and if the situation appears sketchy I've got the safety thumbed off and ready to use.
If you've ever been on the receiving end of this crap you know it's going to deter nearly anybody, though on a windy area it's problematic.
I prefer the ones that shoot a stream or gel.
b) Take a self-defense awareness class or even just watch YouTube videos on the subject. These can increase your sense of safety by reminding you that you can exercise some agency in keeping safe.
c) I suppose if the problem is going to persist long range you need to buy and carry a gun, train sufficiently and become very up on the laws regarding their usage in your area so you don't end up in jail for your legitimate use of same.
We do need to elect people who realize that people are entitled to be safe from crime and these supposedly well intended pro-criminal ideas are not fair to law abiding people.