By Peter Funt

Back on the Fourth of July, buried in the mumbo-jumbo of campaign rhetoric, was a statement by Democrat Martin O’Malley. The former Maryland governor said “patriotism” is rooted in helping others, and among those he singled out were people in prison.

I don’t ever recall a major party candidate in a U.S. presidential election making a plea on behalf of prison inmates. For that matter, I don’t ever recall a sitting president visiting a federal prison to lobby for improvements in America’s criminal justice system — because until July 16 it had never happened.

The tide of opinion is turning quickly concerning the gaping hole in America’s promise to treat citizens fairly. Our poorly run, overcrowded, shamefully inequitable incarceration system is all of a sudden under intense review.

At the El Reno prison in Oklahoma, the president stood outside a 9-by-10 cell that confines three men at a time. “These are young people who made mistakes that aren’t that different from the mistakes I made,” he said, referring to his experiments with drugs while growing up in Hawaii. “The difference is, they did not have the kind of support structures, the second chances, the resources that would allow them to survive those mistakes.”

The president made clear that his focus is on nonviolent offenders, many serving terms imposed under rigid mandatory sentencing laws which have caused the nation’s prison population to explode. This has disproportionately affected young Hispanic and African-American men.

He noted that while the U.S. has 5 percent of the world’s population, it has 20 percent of the world’s prison inmates.

An influential group of Republicans, among them Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, has joined the ranks of those urging prison and judicial reform. Immediately after Obama’s Oklahoma trip, House Speaker John Boehner added his voice to those calling for new sentencing guidelines. With bipartisan support, relatively quick action seems possible.

Yet, it’s worth noting that only 15 percent of the nation’s inmates are held in federal facilities, so much of the needed reforms will have to occur at the state level — certain to be a slower process. By one estimate it could take a decade to restore America’s prison system to merely the level of adequacy of the 1950s.

At this stage, the national focus — likely to work its way into the 2016 presidential campaign — revolves around two primary issues. One is unreasonable sentencing, particularly for nonviolent crimes. The other concerns deplorable prison conditions, made worse in many regions by the bad practice of privatizing prisons.

If progress is made on those hot-button issues, it will be significant. But the problems go deeper. For example, juvenile prosecutions and incarcerations are seriously out of sync with what we know about child development and what we should know about the steps necessary to rehabilitate rather than simply incarcerate young offenders.

High recidivism rates across prison populations create a spiral of crime, unemployment and, in turn, more crime. Over reliance on solitary confinement and inadequate mental health programs contribute to the complex web of concerns.

Also, the continued existence of the death penalty, long after most of the civilized world has abandoned it, clouds our entire criminal justice system.

Some activists fear that the current flurry of interest is but a passing social and political fad. Meaningful reforms, they predict, will take decades.

“I signed a bill that made the problem worse.” So said Bill Clinton the other day about a mandatory sentencing measure he ushered into law in 1994. It’s taken over two decades to get that concession. How long will it take to actually correct the injustice?

By Ron Paul

Last week’s successfully concluded Iran agreement is one of the two most important achievements of an otherwise pretty dismal Obama presidency. Along with the ongoing process of normalizing relations with Cuba, this move shows that diplomacy can produce peaceful, positive changes. It also shows that sometimes taking a principled position means facing down overwhelming opposition from all sides and not backing down. The president should be commended for both of these achievements.

The agreement has reduced the chance of a U.S. attack on Iran, which is a great development. But the interventionists will not give up so easily. Already they are organizing media and lobbying efforts to defeat the agreement in Congress. Will they have enough votes to over-ride a presidential veto of their rejection of the deal? It is unlikely, but at this point if the neocons can force the U.S. out of the deal it may not make much difference. Which of our allies, who are now facing the prospect of mutually-beneficial trade with Iran, will be enthusiastic about going back to the days of a trade embargo? Which will support an attack on an Iran that has proven to be an important trading partner and has also proven reasonable in allowing intrusive inspections of its nuclear energy program?

However, what is most important about this agreement is not that U.S. government officials have conducted talks with Iranian government officials. It is that the elimination of sanctions, which are an act of war, will open up opportunities for trade with Iran. Government-to-government relations are one thing, but real diplomacy is people-to-people: business ventures, tourism, and student exchanges.

I was so impressed when travel personality Rick Steves traveled to Iran in 2009 to show that the U.S. media and government demonization of Iranians was a lie, and that travel and human contact can help defeat the warmongers because it humanizes those who are supposed to be dehumanized.

As I write in my new book, “Swords into Plowshares”:

Our unwise policy with Iran is a perfect example of what the interventionists have given us—60 years of needless conflict and fear for no justifiable reason. This obsession with Iran is bewildering. If the people knew the truth, they would strongly favor a different way to interact with Iran.

Let’s not forget that the Iran crisis started not 31 years ago when the Iran Sanctions Act was signed into law, not 35 years ago when Iranians overthrew the US-installed Shah, but rather 52 years ago when the US CIA overthrew the democratically-elected Iranian leader Mossadegh and put a brutal dictator into power. Our relations with the Iranians are marked by nearly six decades of blowback.

When the Cold War was winding down and the military-industrial complex needed a new enemy to justify enormous military spending, it was decided that Iran should be the latest “threat” to the U.S.. That’s when sanctions really picked up steam. But as we know from our own CIA National Intelligence Estimate of 2007, the stories about Iran building a nuclear weapon were all lies. Though those lies continue to be repeated to this day.

It is unfortunate that Iran was forced to give up some of its sovereignty to allow restrictions on a nuclear energy program that was never found to be in violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. But if the net result is the end of sanctions and at least a temporary reprieve from the constant neocon demands for attack, there is much to cheer in the agreement. Peace and prosperity arise from friendly relations and trade — and especially when governments get out of the way.