Reporter Martin Fackler described a harrowing scene in Tuesday’s New York Times of panicked residents of Yuiage village trying to outrun rising tsunami waters in northeast Japan by escaping to the tallest nearby building -- a junior high school. But the stairwell was crammed with elderly residents sitting on the steps, apparently too feeble to climb to the upper floors. Some younger people scrambling for safety either pushed the older residents aside or stepped over them, said an eye witness. Others formed a human chain to lift the elderly to safety.
The scene illustrates one reason the death toll is so high in Japan’s twin earthquake-tsunami disaster. “The elderly can’t take care of themselves in a disaster like this,” said Jun Kikuchi, a taxi company owner. And Japan has plenty of elderly citizens. In fact, it has the world’s oldest population, many of them concentrated in rural areas like Yuiage.
As reporter Alan Greenblatt points out in our CQ Global Researcher this week, “The Graying Planet,” people around the world are living longer, and couples are having fewer babies. As a result, countries are aging, meaning the proportion of their elderly residents is growing faster than that of their younger residents. And Japan’s population has been aging faster than the rest. Already, more than 20 percent of Japan’s population is older than 65, and that will double by mid-century. In 1963, Japan had 100 centenarians. By 2050, it will have 1 million. Meanwhile, the birth rate has plummeted. Japan had only about 40 percent as many births in 2008 as 60 years earlier. If that trend were to continue, demographers say, the last Japanese baby would be born in 2959.
Japan’s birth rate is so low, in part, because Japanese sons traditionally take in their aging parents, making marriage less attractive to Japanese women, who postpone marriage and have fewer children because they don’t want to have to care for both aging in-laws and their own children. Nearly a third of today’s young Japanese women won’t have any children at all.
Some blame Japan’s weak economic growth in recent decades at least partly on its aging population, since younger generations are the innovators and entrepreneurs. One can only wonder how such an aging population can bounce back from the devastating triple whammy of an earthquake, tsunami and, now, a possible nuclear meltdown.
But, as Greenblatt points out in his report, Japan is not the only nation that’s aging rapidly.
Among the report’s stunning statistics:
• By 2050, the number of children under 5 is expected to drop by 49 million, while the number of adults over 60 will skyrocket — by 1.2 billion. The oldest age groups in developed countries are growing the fastest: By 2050, the number of people age 80 and older will rise by 173 percent.
• The number of Chinese over 65 will triple by 2050. Within 20 years, China will have 167 million people over 65 — more than half the current U.S. population.
• Germany will lose 83 percent of its native population by 2100, as Germans die off and immigrants make up more of the population. The entire nation will have fewer natives than the current population of Berlin.
• The world population could reach 9 billion in the coming decades, but by midcentury it’s likely to stabilize or start shrinking. By 2150 the global population could be half what it is now.
The graying of the planet will trigger demographic changes that will profoundly shape economies, government expenditures and international migration patterns. Recalling the image of the younger Japanese stepping over the elderly as the tsunami waters rose, it’s easy to imagine, as experts predict, that the aging of the planet will pit generation against generation in the race for survival.
--Kathy Koch, managing editor, CQ Global Researcher
Japan’s Aging Population and the Tsunami
Weekly Roundup 3/14/2011
"Japan must concentrate on recovering, learning from quake"
Editorial, The Mainichi Daily News
"Swift response needed for victims of devastating earthquake"
Editorial, Asahi
Synposis: Editorials from the English-language newspaper Mainichi Daily News and the English-language website of Asahi, one of Japan’s largest newspapers, comment on the 9.0 earthquake that struck Japan on Friday. Explore both sites for news and photo coverage of the damage from the world’s fourth-strongest quake in more than a century and the explosions at one of Japan’s nuclear power plants.
Takeaway: “Let us all work together to bring relief to the victims as soon as possible.”
--Kenneth Jost, Associate Editor
Is the United States ready for a major earthquake? See Thomas J. Bilitteri, “Earthquake Threat,” [subscription required] CQ Researcher, April 9, 2010.
*********************
"Japan Disaster Reopens Nuclear Debate in Europe and the U.S."
Stephen Evans, BBC News, March 14, 2011
Synopsis: Just when U.S. environmentalists have hesitantly joined many national governments and the energy industry in backing greater use of nuclear power to cut carbon emissions, Japanese authorities struggle to contain meltdowns at a power plant in last week’s earthquake zone.
Takeaway: “President Obama is in pro-nuclear agreement with Republicans,” writes Evans. “He believes that nuclear power provides a relatively cheap form of energy, and one which doesn't produce global warming gases like coal, gas and oil-fired power stations do. Even environmental groups in the United States, unlike in Europe, believe that nuclear power has a place because of its light carbon footprint. But this was a fragile consensus and it is hard to see how it won't now come under pressure.”
--Marcia Clemmitt, Staff Writer
For background, see Jennifer Weeks, “Managing Nuclear Waste,” [subscription required] CQ Researcher, Jan. 28, 2011.
*********************
“At State-Run Homes, Abuse and Impunity”
Danny Hakim, The New York Times, March 13, 2011
Synopsis: In a year-long investigation, The New York Times found widespread sexual and other abuse of developmentally disabled residents in New York State’s network of more than 2,000 state-run group homes. In hundreds of cases, employees who sexually abused, taunted or beat residents were rarely fired, even after repeated offenses. Often, they were simply transferred to other group homes. Moreover, despite a state law requiring such incidents to be reported to police, fewer than 5 percent of some 13,000 allegations were reported.
Takeaway: Again, another story of horrific abuse that eerily recalls a similar episode, also in New York State, some 50 years ago. Not to go all First Amendment on you, but if you
ever had any doubts about the importance of the right of free speech to our society – and correspondingly the importance of crusading journalism – read this story.
--Thomas J. Colin, Contributing Editor
*********************
“Learning to Love the (Shallow, Divisive, Unreliable) New Media,”
James Fallows, The Atlantic, April, 2011
An influential journalist who had been a speechwriter for President Jimmy Carter, Fallows in the 1990s took up the cause of high-minded journalism consciously devoted to the public good. The news media’s growing appetite for scandal was driving out quality coverage, Fallows wrote at the time. Now, he concedes that the war is over and his side lost – but didn’t lose everything. A tidal wave of “infotainment” hasn’t swept away all serious journalism, he says. And the media and IT industries remain so dynamic, he argues, that new ways of engaging the public on issues and events are sure to emerge.
--Peter Katel, Staff Writer
For background, see Tom Price, “Journalism Standards in the Internet Age,” [subscription required] CQ Researcher, Oct. 8, 2010.
*********************
“Secret Fears of the Super-Rich”
Graeme Wood, The Atlantic, April 2011
A new study by Boston College of the super-wealthy – those with at least $25 million -- finds that money may buy leisure but it may not buy happiness. Some of the nation’s ultra-rich report angst, guilt and an elusive quest for love and self worth.
Takeaway: “If anything, the rich stare into the abyss a bit more starkly than the rest of us,” Wood writes. “We can always indulge in the thought that a little more money would make our lives happier – and in many cases it’s true. But the truly wealthy know that appetites for material indulgence are rarely sated.”
--Thomas J. Billitteri, Managing Editor
For background, see Peter Katel, “Philanthropy in America,” [subscription required] CQ Researcher, Dec. 8, 2006.
Are too many nonviolent offenders sent to prison?
To follow is an excerpt from the CQ Researcher issue "Downsizing Prisons" by Peter Katel on March 11, 2011.
**************
Much of the argument over incarcerating nonviolent offenders centers on drug offenses, which often don't involve direct physical harm to another person. Neither, generally, do theft, burglary and “white collar” crimes.
Amid the states' budget crises, the debate has taken on new urgency. In New Hampshire, a 2010 “justice reinvestment” law limits sentences for nonviolent crimes to no more than 20 percent above the minimum requirement. [Footnote 17]
And even before the budget crisis, the Kansas legislature passed a law in 2007 designed to cut recidivism, with provisions that reduce prison sentences for good behavior and expand parole and probation programs. As a result, the prison population remained virtually flat instead of increasing by a projected 700 inmates. (Budget cuts to programs designed to help ex-prisoners reintegrate into society have pushed recidivism back up, writes Joan Petersilia, co-director of the Stanford University Criminal Justice Center.) [Footnote 18]
But not everyone agrees that violence should be the sole criterion to determine whether an offender is sent to prison or gets probation.
Moreover, the proliferation of drug courts — 2,038 as of July 2009, the most recent figure available — and similar programs for the mentally ill (about 175 courts nationwide) and veterans (about 50) has expanded the options to jail or prison. [Footnote 19]
These alternative programs have tended to make state prison inmates precisely the sorts of dangerous offenders for whom prison was designed, some prosecution-oriented advocates argue.
Scheidegger of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation argues that statistics on the offenses for which state inmates were imprisoned may be misleading. An offender may have physically harmed someone in committing a drug crime, for instance, but be sentenced on the drug offense alone after a deal with prosecutors, he says.
“Ninety percent of prisoners go in under plea bargains,” says Scheidegger. “Those who did not have a violent offense as the offense of commitment are not necessarily nonviolent. Dropping the strongest charge is usually part of a plea bargain.” And nonviolent offenders may be incarcerated because they have a record of violence, he says.
But Indiana public defender Landis says that in his experience, plea bargains haven't followed the pattern Scheidegger laid out. “We don't break down too many crimes that are violent to a nonviolent offense,” says Landis. A plea bargain might, for instance, lower a charge of rape with serious bodily injury to rape plain and simple, he says. But rape by definition is a violent act. “You would never,” he says, “call that pleading out to a nonviolent crime.”
An offender's record of past offenses inevitably influences the sentencing process, Landis acknowledges. But “you ought to do the time for the crime,” he says, referring to a defendant's current case, “not for the crime you already did the time for.”
While the philosophical argument about who belongs behind bars is complex, an even more complicated question is whether defendants whose crimes indisputably didn't involve violence should be sent to prison.
In Missouri, Supreme Court Chief Justice William Ray Price Jr. has declared that his state imprisons too many nonviolent offenders. But Stanley Cox, Missouri House Judiciary Committee chairman, disagrees. “There is a class of lawbreakers who by their own intention and design have become such a threat — not a violent threat, but a threat — to society that it is better to incarcerate them,” says Cox.
Cox, a Sedalia Republican and former state prosecutor, adds, “It is false to believe that prisons, certainly in this state, are filled with people who end up there because they committed one nonviolent offense. That is absolutely not true. The people who fill our prisons, including these nonviolent offenders, are people who just never took the breaks they were offered. They offended, were placed on probation, and reoffended multiple times.”
But Philadelphia District Attorney R. Seth Williams told the Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies Subcommittee on Feb. 11 that “people who commit the most crimes over and over are people who commit low-level property crimes. We don't need to send so many people who are nonviolent — through mandatory sentences — to prison.”
Williams also argued that high levels of recidivism by nonviolent offenders show evidence of system failure as much as individual shortcomings. “Where did society fail that person?” he asked. “What can we do to teach that person to be a barber or a cobbler or an auto mechanic or some real job?” Once they're trained, he said, “We won't see them again.”
The Issues
* Can states afford to maintain their current prison populations?
* Are too many nonviolent offenders sent to prison?
* Can diversion programs substitute for imprisonment?
For more information on the CQ Researcher report on "Downsizing Prisons" [subscription required] or purchase the PDF.
**************
Footnotes
[17] Clement, et al., op. cit., pp. 65-66.
[18] Ibid., pp. 60-61. See also Joan Petersilia, “Beyond the Prison Bubble,” Wilson Quarterly, winter 2011, www.wilsonquarterly.com/article.cfm?AID=1774.
[19] “Drug Courts — Facts and Figures,” National Criminal Justice Reference Guide, updated Sept. 1, 2010, www.ncjrs.gov/spotlight/drug_courts/facts.html; Emma Schwartz, “Mental Health Courts,” U.S. News & World Report, Feb. 7, 2008, www.usnews.com/news/national/articles/2008/02/07/mental-health-courts; “Justice for Vets,” National Association of Drug Court Professionals, updated Feb. 14, 2011, www.nadcp.org/JusticeForVets. For background, see Marcia Clemmitt, “Combating Addiction,” CQ Researcher, Feb. 9, 2007, pp. 121-144.
Military Trials to Resume at Guantanamo
By Kenneth Jost
Associate Editor
Faced with congressional resistance to closing the Guantanamo Bay prison camp, President Obama has announced new steps to resume military trials for detainees and to create a military-civilian review board for prisoners being held there without trial.
The White House said on Monday (March 7) that the Pentagon will lift the suspension imposed in January 2009 on referring new cases for prosecution before so-called military commissions. Administration officials said new procedures established by a law passed in 2009 make the commissions “a more credible and effective tool for justice.”
Obama also issued an executive order creating a six-member board to review cases of detainees who are not being brought to trial. Detainees can continue to be held if the predominantly civilian board finds that detention is “necessary to protect against a significant threat to the security of the United States.”
The moves bow to the reality that Obama’s post-inauguration pledge to close Guantanamo within a year is now, two years later, unachievable in the foreseeable future. While under Democratic control, Congress last year added provisions to the Defense Department authorization bill that prohibit bringing Guantanamo detainees to the United States for civilian trials and impose difficult-to-meet conditions on transferring detainees to other countries.
Obama reluctantly signed the measure into law but said he would urge Congress to repeal the restrictions. In his statement on Monday, Obama reiterated his support for using civilian trials against some suspected terrorists. “The American system of justice is a key part of our arsenal in the war against al Qaeda and its affiliates,” Obama said.
The moves drew favorable reaction from some experts but sharp criticism from the American Civil Liberties Union. “Today’s executive order institutionalizes indefinite detention, which is unlawful, unwise and un-American,” said ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero.
Guantanamo held 240 prisoners when Obama took office on Jan. 20, 2009; today, there are 172 prisoners. The administration has succeeded in transferring 67 prisoners to other countries, but only by dint of rigorous diplomatic arm-twisting. One detainee died in custody.
The Pentagon funding measure prohibits future transfers unless the secretary of defense certifies that the receiving country meets specified security conditions. A substantial number of the remaining detainees are Yemenis; the administration was unable to reach security agreements with the Yemeni government even before the current unrest.
The Bush administration established the framework for trying Guantanamo detainees before military tribunals, but with legal challenges and logistical difficulties it won convictions in only three cases: two by guilty pleas and one after trial. The Obama administration has won guilty pleas in two additional cases.
The White House said military commissions “should proceed in cases where it has been determined appropriate to do so.” One of the cases likely to be among the first to come to trial is the prosecution of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the alleged mastermind of the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole. Al-Nashiri, a Saudi of Yemeni descent, has been imprisoned at Guantanamo since 2006.
Administration officials refused to comment on plans for trying Guantanamo’s highest-profile prisoner: Khalid Sheik Mohammed (KSM), the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Attorney General Eric Holder announced plans in November 2009 to try Mohammed and four co-conspirators in a federal court in New York City, but the plan provoked a public and political backlash and has been on hold ever since.
Officials acknowledged the congressional restrictions would bar a civilian trial in the United States at present. A White House fact-sheet termed the restrictions “a dangerous and unprecedented challenge to Executive authority” and said the administration would urge Congress to repeal them.
A Justice Department task force concluded last year that 48 detainees should continue to be held at Guantanamo but were “not feasible for prosecution.” The executive order Obama issued on Monday creates a Periodic Review Board for those cases to include representatives of the State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security departments; the directorate of National Intelligence; and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Detainees will be entitled to a hearing before the board within one year, assisted by a government-appointed “personal representative.” If the board determines detention is warranted, a “file review” is to be conducted every six months and another full review in three years. Deborah Pearlstein, a law professor formerly with the advocacy group Human Rights First, called the procedure “a positive development.”
For background, see "Closing Guantanamo," CQ Researcher, Feb. 27, 2009 (subscription required).
Weekly Roundup 3/7/2011
"States Prosecute Fewer Teenagers in Adult Courts"
Mosi Secret, The New York Times, March 6, 2011
Synopsis: Several states have moved or are moving to raise the age at which teenagers accused of crimes are treated as adults instead of being tried in juvenile courts. The trend reverses the get-tough policy of a generation ago when youth crime was at record levels. Proponents say juvenile courts offer social services better suited to redirecting youthful offenders; opponents are raising the additional costs of juvenile services in resisting the trend.
For background, see Thomas J. Billitteri, “Youth Violence,” [subscription required] CQ Researcher, March 5, 2010.
--Kenneth Jost, Associate Editor
*************************
"In States, Parties Clash Over Voting Laws That Call for IDs, Limits on Where College Students Can Cast Ballots"
Peter Wallsten, Washington Post, March 7, 2011
Synopsis: Newly elected Republican leaders of state legislatures around the country are pushing to tighten voter-registration laws by requiring photo IDs and banning temporary residents such as students and military personnel from voting in a state that’s only their part-time home. Part of the rationale, as articulated by at least one lawmaker: College students don’t have what it takes to be intelligent voters.
Takeaway: “New Hampshire's new Republican state House speaker is pretty clear about what he thinks of college kids and how they vote. They're ‘foolish,’ Speaker William O'Brien said in a recent speech to a tea party group. ‘Voting as a liberal. That's what kids do,’ he added, his comments taped by a state Democratic Party staffer and posted on YouTube. Students lack ‘life experience,’ and ‘they just vote their feelings.’”
--Marcia Clemmitt, Staff Writer
*************************
"The Liberation of Lori Berenson"
Jennifer Egan, The New York Times, March 2, 2011
Synopsis:
Lori Berenson was an idealistic American graduate of M.I.T. who moved to Peru hoping to change the world. She was convicted and imprisoned for 15 years for aiding anti-government revolutionaries. This is her sobering post-release story.
Takeaway: We Americans are perhaps inured to breathless stories about terrorists from exotic lands, but this story is about someone who could have been the girl next door. It adds an important perspective to previous stories about terrorists and their motivation.
For background, see Barbara Mantel, “Terrorism and the Internet," [subscription required] CQ Global Researcher, November 2009; and Kenneth Jost, “Democracy in Latin America,” [subscription required] Nov. 3, 2000
--Thomas J. Colin, Contributing Editor
