Congress Should Let DC Fund Needle Exchange
Back during our jury civil disobedience in 2004, David Guard and I did our community service time at the needle exchange program here in Washington and got to know the people there. They've been doing a lot for the community, all of it with privately-raised funds, but more is needed to be able to reach all the people who are at risk from contracting diseases like AIDS or Hepatitis C through needle sharing. The District of Columbia government would almost certainly fund needle exchange work, but Congress gets to control what our budget looks like if they want to, and in their infinite wisdom (sarcasm) they decided to forbid DC from spending even its own taxpayer dollars on needle exchange.
Rep. Jose Serrano (D-NY), who chairs the Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government, which has jurisdiction over this area of the US Code, has said he wants to undo the restriction. Today the New York Times ran a strongly supportive editorial:
Washington, D.C., is one of Americaâs AIDS hot spots. A significant proportion of infections can be traced back to intravenous drug users who shared contaminated needles and then passed on the infection to spouses, lovers or unborn children. This public health disaster is partly the fault of Congress. It has wrongly and disastrously used its power over the District of Columbiaâs budget to bar the city from spending even locally raised tax dollars on programs that have slowed the spread of disease by giving drug addicts access to clean needles.The Times titled the editorial "Congress Hobbles the AIDS Fight." The activist paraphrase of that, which is how the editorial was first presented to me, would be "Congress has blood on its hands." Last week the Times also ran a news feature about DC's needle exchange, and an online "slide show" featuring the program's Ron Daniels. The larger legislation in which the DC funding ban could get repealed is expected to move quickly, with markups scheduled for Serrano's subcommittee tomorrow and the Appropriations Committee of which it is a part next week -- you never know how quickly something will really move in Congress, but that's how it looks right now. Stay tuned.
If You Like CSI: Miami, Youâll Love the Westwood College of Criminal Justice!
Thereâs something rather disturbing about TV ads for trade school criminal justice degrees. You may have seen them: âCall now to begin your exciting career in this growing industry! Help put the bad guys behind bars!â
As the proud owner of a bachelorâs degree in criminal justice, I find it more than a little unnerving to see this complicated subject reduced to a flashy 30-second TV commercial. Unlike most career opportunities, the field of criminal justice ideally shouldnât be a âgrowing industry.â Everyone knows criminals are bad, and the brand of justice getting administered these days is often a crime in itself. Americaâs ongoing crime problems are more depressing than âexciting,â and the solution is not for more people to get up off the couch and start cracking skulls.
This weekend I saw a new ad for Westwood College, which begins with a man in the shower reading Miranda rights to an imaginary suspect. An announcer then says something to the effect of "do you fantasize about a career in law-enforcement? Call Westwood todayâ¦" Iâm left wondering if I really want this crazy idiot who plays cop in the shower running around my neighborhood with a badge and a gun.
Westwood Collegeâs criminal justice page does little to placate my pessimism:
Why are there so many TV shows about the criminal justice system? Because it's exciting. All the dynamic elements that make for great TV also make for a great career.
Are you taking notes, class? Lesson 1: being a police officer is just like being an action hero on TV. So if youâve been watching enough CSI Miami, youâll ace Forensics and probably Firearms, too. You could take engineering if you want, but then youâd be wasting all that career experience you absorbed inadvertently by watching Law & Order: Criminal Intent. Did you know Vincent DâOnofrio and Chris Noth are team-teaching the section on homicide interrogation?
Seriously though, comparing any activity to being on TV automatically appeals to the lowest common denominator. It should go without saying that anyone whoâs apt to believe that a career in policing is as exciting as watching The Shield probably shouldnât be enforcing laws in real life. Itâs a particularly disturbing prospect in this context since police on TV are often trigger-happy and prone to habitual misconduct. Surely these arenât the âdynamic elementsâ Westwood has in mind, but if they have a clue what kind of crap passes for crime drama these days, they ought not to invite the comparison.