What's the truth about Dukakis' "Weekened Passes"

[Hippo_Tron]

How did Willie Horton really get out of prison?

[bemildred]

1. Utter horseshit. nt

[FredScuttle]

2. It'll shock you

Gov. Dukakis personally picked up Willie from prison, drove him to the house, and knocked on the door. He then escorted Willie in and kept watch while he assaulted the couple. After Willie was done, Dukakis drove him back to prison and even gave him a state pardon in case this nastiness should ever become public.

Yours,
the Ghost of Lee Atwater

[mcd1982]

3. from what I remember...

the furlough program was started by Mass. REPULICAN governor before Dukakis' time. So Dukakis didn't "let" anyone go.

[Pepperbelly]

4. it was total horseshit because ...

the gop has no problem with lying for political gain.

The hard reality is that furlough programs are designed to do one thing: facilitate control of the inmate populations within state prisons. Without furlough, without "good time", without work-release, there is nothing to cause good order in the prisons. Remember, the institutions run with the inmates' consent. I am NOT being facetious either.

[Hippo_Tron]

6. Understandable, but...

Willie Horton shouldn't have been furloughed unsupervised. I'm told that wasn't official policy, though, and only happened from a fluke.

[Igel]

5. This seems like an uncomfortably reasonable summary:

http://www.answers.com/topic/michael-dukakis

"The most controversial of Bush's attacks involved Dukakis's support for a prison furlough program that resulted in the release of convicted murderer Willie Horton, who committed a rape in Maryland after his escape. Al Gore was the first candidate to publicly raise the furlough issue, in a debate held in New York prior to the Democratic primary in that state, although Gore never mentioned Horton by name.

"Bush did mention Horton by name in a speech in June, 1988 and his campaign brought up the Horton case repeatedly. An independent group, the National Security Political Action Committee, aired an ad entitled "Weekend Passes" which used a mug shot image of Horton, who is African American. That ad campaign was followed by a separate Bush campaign ad, "Revolving Door," criticizing Dukakis over the furlough program without mentioning Horton. Dukakis was unable to refute criticism of his veto of a bill passed by the Massachusetts legislature to limit the furlough program, and his refusal to apologize to Horton's victims.

Almost forgotten in the furor, however, was that Dukakis himself ran a furlough advertisement in the Southwest that featured a Hispanic killer, Angel Medrano. Dukakis was trying to accuse Bush of hypocrisy since Medrano escaped from the federal furlough program under President Ronald Reagan. But the commercial backfired when it caused the public simply to see Dukakis as just as negative a campaigner as Bush was."

[LiberalFighter]

7. Floyd Brown political consultant for Americans for Bush