The Police State of California

A comparison of "Police States": California vs. DPRK (North Korea):
The State of California has incarcerated thousands of political prisoners, including those who organize their community in opposition to the governing ideology and those who engage in personal use of narcotics, yet is perceived across the world as a jurisdiction governed by a government which respects personal "freedom", as opposed to the DPRK government, which, because it has been described as incarcerating thousands of political prisoners (including narcotics users and petty criminals), is perceived as a government which is terrifying to most people in the United States.* DPRK has a jurisdiction with a population of 24.5 million people as of 2013.
* State of California has a jurisdiction with a population of 38 million people as of 2013.
* Political Prisoners are defined as people who break laws pertaining to cognitive attributes, either by speaking in public about unlawful topics (such as revolution), or engaging in a behavior which is not harmful but is considered unlawful (such as smoking cannabis).

Total Population of prisoners in California for 2008 is 171,264, according to the "AVERAGE DAILY PRISON POPULATION BY COMMITMENT TYPE, FACILITY TYPE AND LEVEL OF INSTITUTION Calendar Year 2008" table of information published in the 2009-01 "AVERAGE DAILY PRISON POPULATION, CALENDAR YEAR 2008 (Reference Number: IPOP-2)" from the California Department of Corrections, Offender Information Services Branch, Estimates and Statistical Analysis Section, Data Analysis Unit in Sacramento, California   
[www.cdcr.ca.gov/Reports_Research/Offender_Information_Services_Branch/Annual/IPOP2/IPOP2d0812.pdf]:



2013-03-04 "Political prisoners in N. Korea reduced to maximum 120,000: report"
from "Yonhap News Agency" [english.yonhapnews.co.kr/northkorea/2013/03/04/4/0401000000AEN20130304010800315F.HTML]:
SEOUL, March 4 (Yonhap) -- North Korea may have reduced the number of political prisoners and closed one of its notorious political prison camps, a report in Seoul said Monday, suggesting that the changes, however, do not mean improvement in the human rights conditions in the country.
The report by the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul said, "A minimum of 80,000 to a maximum of 120,000 political prisoners are estimated to be detained in five political prisons."
The report said last year's closure of the political prison camp in Hoeryong, North Hamgyong Province, may have brought the total number of political concentration camps to five.
The figures compare with the government's estimation of around 154,000 political prisoners in the North, submitted to the National Assembly in October 2009.
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