Rachel follows up on Arizona & Prisons for Profit

Last Friday, Rachel Maddow continued her coverage of Corrections Corporation of America, the Prison-for-Profit company that's working to "help" Arizona increase its state and federal incarcerations — because more incarcerations means more money, and that's just good business, right?

She interviewed Morgan Loew of KPHO-TV, who is doing terrific investigative work — the kind of work that's mostly done these days by tier-1 mags, like Rolling Stone and the New Yorker, and local writers like Jon Ralston at the Las Vegas Sun.

It turns out CCA's fingerprints are all over the "Send Browns to Prison" law. Not only did unelected Gov. Jan Brewer employ two CCA lobbyists on her staff — but the bill itself was introduced by Russell Pearce, senate Appropriations chairman and a man with huge ties to CCA (and far-right hate groups in general).

The whole segment is here. This is the Russell Pearce part:



(There's a nice little light show of video artifacts about 30 seconds into this clip — you're welcome.)

Unelected Gov. Brewer is up to her eyeballs in this and she knows it. Go to this post, our earlier coverage of Rachel and CCA, and watch the clip at the 8:20 mark. She can't get away from the questioner fast enough.

I'll say what Rachel says — This is only marginally about jailing browns and blacks. (Remember those heavy-handed drug laws?)

Like all things Tea Party, this is really just that old post-bellum Southern Strategy, the original one: The rich guy shouts the N-word at the poor white sharecropper, then robs the both of them blind.

It's all about the Benjamins, folks. The beast wants only money, this beast especially, and it has no conscience at all. Those Tea Bags are just stage props.

If there's a Hell, this beast is going straight to the mouth of Satan.


Wonder where the Tea Bags are going.

GP

(If you really want to follow up on this subject, the comments to our earlier coverage contains several excellent items. For example, see here on placement of private prisons; here on judges who get kickbacks, up to $3 million, from private prison operators; here for the potential for forced-labor abuse; and here for lack of job training in Prison-for-Profit operations.)