The Compassion Budget
President Bush was Cincinnati yesterday, talking about compassion (because it makes a much better campaign issue than "Over 800 American Troops Dead in Iraq."
And here are a few of the Remarks by the President in a Conversation on Compassion that struck me:
Government can hand out money--and we're going to talk a little bit about the money we want to hand out--but government cannot put hope in a person's heart or a sense of purpose in a person's life. That happens when a loving soul, like Charlene puts her arm around somebody who hurts and says, what can I do to help you? What can I do to make your life a better life? How can I, a citizen of America, interface with you, to help you understand there is a bright hope and a better future?
"How can I, a citizen of America, interface with you"??? Bush has never actually helped anybody, has he?
But I did like this next part:
I know I don't need to say this to people here, but if you're interested in serving your country, volunteer; become a mentor, feed the hungry, find shelter for the homeless. If you really want to be a super patriot, join the army of compassion.
Since they have failed to support the war by joining the infantry, I expect super-patriots Ann Coulter, Ben Shapiro, and the entire 101st Fighting Keyboarders® (a registered trademark of TBoggCo Inc.) to start feeding the hungry and sheltering the homeless.
Now, on to curing addicts and rehabilitating prisoners:
If you want to change your habits, you need to change your heart. Government is not very good about changing hearts, see. Government is law and justice; government isn't love. But you can change your heart by interfacing with people who may have heard a call from above.
I love that last line too much to even mock it.
And we, in government, ought not to worry about the process involved in these programs. We ought to just ask the question, are these programs working? That's what we want to know.
The government ought not worry about the process involved in these programs? Um, okay -- but are we, as a nation, ready to pay for faith-based Clockwork Orange rehabilitation centers?
And now the President is going to tell us a story:
I'll never forget, when I was the governor of Texas, I went to a prison unit; I decided to turn over a wing of the prison to a faith--based program. Again, the attitude was whether or not the prisoners would come out and not go back in. I said the recidivism rate would--could it be lowered if we had a faith--based initiative in the prison unit?
And so I went to see it as the governor. And out comes the prison choir. And one of my favorite hymns is "Amazing Grace." Of course, I've got a lot of my mother in me, so I immediately jumped in line with the prisoners singing "Amazing Grace," you know, like 10 white suits and me. (Laughter.)
Sorry to interrupt the President, but I have to ask: why does having a lot of Barbara Bush in him cause him to jump in line with prisoners and sing "Amazing Grace"? Is Barbara secretly known for hanging out with chain gangs?
Well, I guess he's not going to answer, so I'll let him get back to his story.
They weren't exactly suits, they were, like, you know--you know the kind of the suit I'm talking about--jumpers, yes. (Laughter.) And, anyway, we're swinging back and forth, and on the front page of The Houston Chronicle is Bush arm--in--arm with a guy in prison for 20 years.
Let me tell you something, I welcomed some people to the White House who had been involved in this program, and I looked a the man sitting next to me in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, and sure enough, it was the guy who I was arm--in--arm with, singing, "Amazing Grace."
You can go from prison to be a boss. You can go from prison to the White House, just so long as you have somebody who's there, willing to take you by the hand, and say, I want to help you help yourself. And that's what we're here to talk about. (Applause.)
That faith-based prison program was InnerChange Freedom Initiative, which was started by Chuck Colson's Prison Fellowship. And Chuck is the boss of his group. So, yes, you CAN go from prison to the White House -- if you are Chuck Colson. And from the White House to prison. It really is an inspiring story.
But, like the President said, "We ought to just ask the question, are these programs working? That's what we want to know."
The answer in regard to InnerChange Freedom Initiative seems to be "not really."
Although a Penn State study seemed to show that those completing the program were much less likely to return to prison than the control group (causing the Wall Street Journal to say "critics of the faith-based approach may claim that their only issue is with religion. But if these results are any clue, increasingly the argument against such programs requires turning a blind eye to science." However, as crime control expert Mark A.R. Kleiman explained last year in Slate, the study actually indicated that those enrolled in the faith-based program had a higher recidivism rate than the control group.
Kleiman explains:
When he was governor of Texas, Bush invited Charles Colson's Prison Fellowship to start InnerChange Freedom Initiative, a Bible-centered prison-within-a-prison where inmates undergo vigorous evangelizing, prayer sessions, and intensive counseling*. Now comes a study from the University of Pennsylvania's Center for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society reporting that InnerChange graduates have been rearrested and reimprisoned at dramatically lower rates than a matched control group.
For those who know how hard it is to reduce recidivism, the reported results were impressive. Colson celebrated the report by visiting the White House for a photo op with the president. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay issued a triumphal press release.
[...]
But when you look carefully at the Penn study, it's clear that the program didn't work. The InnerChange participants did somewhat worse than the controls: They were slightly more likely to be rearrested and noticeably more likely (24 percent versus 20 percent) to be reimprisoned. ...
So, how did the Penn study get perverted into evidence that InnerChange worked? Through one of the oldest tricks in the book, one almost guaranteed to make a success of any program: counting the winners and ignoring the losers. ...
Here's how the study got adulterated.
InnerChange started with 177 volunteer prisoners but only 75 of them "graduated." Graduation involved sticking with the program, not only in prison but after release. No one counted as a graduate, for example, unless he got a job. Naturally, the graduates did better than the control group. Anything that selects out from a group of ex-inmates those who hold jobs is going to look like a miracle cure, because getting a job is among the very best predictors of staying out of trouble. And inmates who stick with a demanding program of self-improvement through 16 months probably have more inner resources, and a stronger determination to turn their lives around, than the average inmate.
The InnerChange cheerleaders simply ignored the other 102 participants who dropped out, were kicked out, or got early parole and didn't finish. Naturally, the non-graduates did worse than the control group. If you select out the winners, you leave mostly losers.
Overall, the 177 entrants did a little bit worse than the controls. That result ought to discourage InnerChange's advocates, but it doesn't because they have just ignored the failure of the failures and focused on the success of the successes.
[...]
InnerChange program manager Jerry Wilger says he doesn't know much about research, but he doesn't think it's fair to count the performance of the people who dropped out of his program against him, a fair-sounding objection that misses the point entirely. If InnerChange's 177 entrants were truly matched to the control group but ended up having more recidivism, then either the apparent success with the graduates was due to "creaming" or the program somehow managed to make its dropouts worse than they were to start with. If the program genuinely helped its graduates and didn't harm its dropouts, and if the whole group of entrants was truly matched to the controls, then the group of 177 should have done better than the controls. And they didn't.
But the good news is that the prison choir is back together, so Bush can drop by to sing spirituals with them whenever the fancy takes him.
Oh, and here's more info about Bush's faith-based proposed expenditures from the White House's FACT SHEET: COMPASSION IN ACTION:
The President's budget for FY 2005 continues to support the compassion of America by requesting more than $400 million for programs to support healthy marriages, research and demonstration projects on family formation, and initiatives to promote responsible fatherhood.
Yesterday Jesse at Pandagon pointed us to a study showing that conservative Protestant Christians have, on average, the highest divorce rate in America, while atheists and agnostics have the lowest rate. So, instead of giving grants to "faith-based and community organizations for skill-based marriage and parenting education," shouldn't we have the atheists and agnostics doing the educating? (Lack-of-faith-based programs, anyone?)
The President's budget for FY 2005 also supports achieving personal responsibility through $200 million in funding for his Access to Recovery drug treatment voucher program, and $75 million in funding to help former offenders stay away from crime by providing access to job training, housing options, and transitional services.
Hmm, $75 million to provide job training and housing options to recovering addicts. That sounds like a responsible use of tax payer funds.
Supporting Personal Responsibility through Abstinence Education: To encourage teens to take personal responsibility for their actions and to encourage parents to educate their children about the dangers of early sexual activity, the President announced his abstinence initiative during the 2004 State of the Union address. The initiative includes doubling the funding -- from $135 million to more than $270 million -- for abstinence-only education programs, developing model abstinence-only education curricula, ensuring the Federal government is sending a consistent message to teens, and creating a public education campaign for parents and teens about this important issue.
Hmm, $270 million for abstinence-only education programs -- that sounds like a stupid use of tax payer funds.
The total faith-based FY 2005 budget comes to over $700 million, if my calculations are correct (I believe that items like "Steps to a HealthierUS program" for which the President requested $125 million, while considered compassionate, aren't faith-based -- but I could be wrong).
If you have any questions about any of this, you're in luck, for, as a little square on the Fact Sheet informs us, there's going to be a Compassion Discussion this morning:
Discuss the President's Compassion Agenda on Tuesday, June 22 on "Ask the White House."
Tuesday's Guest, 10:00am (ET):
Jim Towey
Director, Office of Faith Based and Community Initiatives
Click here for to submit a question.
My question: "for to submit"???
Anyway, after hearing about President Bush's compassionate agenda, I still don't plan to vote for him in November -- but it's nice to know that if some of his senior officials go to prison for leaking classified information about a CIA employee, there's a faith-based plan to help rehabilitate them.
2:04:11 AM 
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