Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Prison labor; John Radcliffe
Yet, this is a subject that is sensitive. It’s also a hard one for a lot of people to discuss. It’s hard, after all, to have sympathy for people who are committing a crime — that’s pointed out in the reaction that a lot of people have to the idea of prisoners getting a raise. They don’t think they deserve it. At the same time, however, there are some prisoners who have risked their lives to help others during wildfires. There are also others who are being used for entertainment. We had NO idea that there are prisoners who take part in what is a dangerous form of rodeo, where they try to play poker while a bull crashes into them. That may be an outlier, but it is an interesting example nonetheless.
The problem is that the prison income is so low, some prisoners are not even able to pay for some basic necessities — ones that are not provided by the prison itself. Another problem is that for families wanting to send money to an inmate, they can often be charged extreme amounts of money just for transaction feeds. That’s without even dealing with the expensive cost of phone conversations.
The segment tonight is probably not going to do that much to change those with a hardline stance against paying more for prison labor; but, for some out there, maybe it will cause them to think about the situation a little more than they would otherwise. That may be all that Oliver is hoping for.
Meanwhile, earlier on in the episode, Oliver led a conversation on John Radcliffe, one of Donald Trump’s latest appointees who quickly decided to step down. What was this? More so than anything, we’d argue that it was a reminder that in his world, he allows the media to do most of the vetting for him. As a matter of fact, he even admitted that while speaking to reporters.
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