Kentucky shocker: corrections bill passes!

It was shaping up to be a spectacular year in Kentucky for the Tea Party thought police and its Operation UNITE allies. State lawmakers seemed itching to make criminals out of everybody - especially the poor - and stick all of us with the cost. Bill after bill was built on confrontation, prohibition, and class warfare - and the problem was bipartisan.

But today it began crashing down for Kentucky teabaggers.

In a stark turn of events, the Kentucky Senate has just unanimously approved an amazing corrections reform bill that I can't believe passed at all. This after the Kentucky House approved it 96 to 1. This long-overdue legislation - which now drifts to the governor's desk for his signature - would save taxpayers countless dollars by promoting alternate sentencing instead of prison for some drug offenders and other nonviolent lawbreakers.

The drug warriors are hopping mad at this bill's passage! Tough shit.

Kentucky's prison-industrial complex has expanded so much in 30 years that the number of prison inmates has tripled. It's costly for taxpayers, and it turns many folks into jailed statistics for acts that weren't even illegal until fairly recently.

That this bill could pass in Kentucky today is remarkable. Once it's signed into law, some things will have to be worked out, of course. Specifically, we have to make sure bad rehabs don't take advantage of it. But the prison pipeline just got a nice kink in it.

I'm particularly surprised by the unanimity of the bill's support. Are our lawmakers actually getting the message for once? Have they logged off from Facebook for 5 minutes and actually listened to what people want (instead of screaming "druggie druggie druggie!" every time somebody disagrees with them)? It seems like when a bill passes unanimously, it's usually not a good bill, but this is a rare exception.

Don't count on legislators' foray into sanity lasting very long - though I can only hope that it does. Remember, the drug warriors' pseudoephedrine and drug testing bills are still waiting in the wings, and how I long to see both bills fail.