Reddit reviews In Defense of Flogging

If you gave me a choice of five years in jail or two years and 10 strokes, I’ll pick the latter every time.

There’s a book by a US liberal talking about this:

https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Flogging-Peter-Moskos/dp/0465032419

Worth the read.

In Defense of Flogging by Peter Moskos

"Prisons impose tremendous costs, yet they're easily ignored. Criminals-- even low-level nonviolent offenders-- enter our dysfunctional criminal justice system and disappear into a morass that's safely hidden from public view. Our "tough on crime" political rhetoric offers us no way out, and prison reformers are too quickly dismissed as soft on criminals. Meanwhile, the taxpayer picks up the extraordinary and unnecessary bill.
In Defense of Flogging presents a solution both radical and simple: give criminals a choice between incarceration and the lash. Flogging is punishment: quick, cheap, and honest.

Noted criminologist Peter Moskos, in irrefutable style, shows the logic of the new system while highlighting flaws in the status quo. Flogging may be cruel, but In Defense of Flogging shows us that compared to our broken prison system, it is the lesser of two evils."

http://www.amazon.com/Defense-Flogging-Peter-Moskos/dp/0465032419/ref=la_B001ILIFXY_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1396365924&sr=1-3