Bummer — there’s no room at the inn. More precisely, local jails are over capacity and trying to export their inmates out of state. Personally, I’m all for it (isn’t that what Australia’s for? . . . ), but apparently there are rules, regulations and basic human rights involved, so we’re stuck with all our dealers, druggies, rapists and jaywalkers. What’s the brilliant plan so far to deal with this situation, now that jail expansion has been voted down?– convert the laundry rooms into cells and have the laundry done by outside companies. Cool, so now when I stop by the dry cleaner, I can expect to check out the latest in prison fashion.

I have a better idea: Let’s institute an adopt-a-con program. Only the non-violent felons would be eligible, and only those on the outside who voted against jail expansion would be required to participate. As the jails get crowded, some lucky low-level criminal gets shipped off to the loving home of a jail nay-sayer. Jails become less crowded, the adopter gets a handy household/yard worker and a (low) stipend to cover part of the cost of feeding and bathing their bouncing bubbly con, and we can all rest easy knowing we’ve come up with a humane solution to the problem of jail/prison overcrowding. You can all thank me later.

And on a completely different testicle, did the Idaho property tax relief bill get signed into effect or not? Spokesman-Review states that it passed and the governor will sign it into law as soon as it reaches his desk, the Post Falls Press (not known for editorial excellence, so I might question their reporting acumen as well) states that it was rejected by the House. Or maybe the Senate. It’s too early in the day to be faced with this sort of confusion and contradiction, dammit!

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