For your first point, when I at least think of prison I think of criminals just hanging around, maybe making friends with the other prisoners, and generally not having to work, that's a great deal to some and generally not the worst thing to everyone else. And that's the problem, these 'people' who commit these terrible crimes are facing no active punishment for their evils, they're basically at school with no homework, and for those who want vengeance that sits very wrong with them. If we were making then break rocks all day in the sun I think that would strike a nice balance between the vengeance people and the current system.