What a darn thing to say

[ironrice]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050930/...s/bennett_race
So kill blacks babies and the crime will go down. I see, I guess I'll see this fooker at the next klans' meeting.

[NWG35]

This whole thing is being grandstanded and to a degree misrepresented. What happened and what he said in context was:

Bennett, on his radio show, "Morning in America," was answering a caller's question when he took issue with the hypothesis put forth in a recent book that one reason crime is down is that abortion is up.

"But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down," said Bennett, author of "The Book of Virtues."

He went on to call that "an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down. So these far-out, these far-reaching, extensive extrapolations are, I think, tricky."

He was answering something a caller proposed. He definitely went about it wrong though. What he said and the way he said it could just as easily have been: Abort all male babies and the crime rate would drop drastically.

Why? Because it's VERY obvious that 90% or more of all crime in the US is commited by males. So yes, that alone, in a vaccum would eliminate a large chunk of crime. However, it would also remove a huge chunk of people from the workforce, destroy the economy, families, and have repercussions throughout the rest of time.

Look at what he said from a data driven, scientific only perspective, and stop being like the media and focusing on the fact that someone use a race nomiker and abortion in the same sentance.

[sandking]

oooowie! I gotta chyme in on this one.

What is the majority ethnicity of inmates in prison's accross the country? If I'm not mistaken, it's black. So I believe he meant to say what he said just as it has been interpretted. He might as well have gone on to justify Hitler's reasons for slaughtering all the jewish people in Europe. I know some people don't want ot believe it, but racism still isn't dead... it's just more politically correct.

"Bennett was education secretary under President Reagan and director of drug control policy when Bush's father was president"

And you wonder how the minority communities have such a huge drug problem. I bet its because the director of drug control policy would allow certain shipments of drugs to particualr demographic groups. Weren't there reports a while back stating how gov. agencies would flood the ghettos with cocaine?

Provide those of whom you wish to defeat with weapons of self destruction. Then stand back and laugh as they do the dirty work for you. It's the same premis/reason why there's a gun store and liquor store on every corner in the ghetto.

[NWG35]

The majority of inmates in the US prison system are white males - 56.8%

Black comes in second at 39.8%

http://www.bop.gov/news/quick.jsp

However, if you consider that the ratio of black to white in the US is roughly 7:1 in favor of white, you could try to point out that the percentage ratio in the prison system should follow suit and with ~60% white, and a 7:1 ratio, the black percentage should fall closer to 8% rather than ~40%.

This is neither here nor there, as you cannot generalize about things like this, it doesn't take into account socio-economic backgrounds of the prisoners, if they had both parents, what area of the country they were raised in, education levels, morals parents instilled in them etc. All of those are factors into what makes a person who they become as an adult.

What IS the topic here, is that a LISTENER to the show, called in and wanted him to comment on a BOOK someone ELSE wrote, which brings up the fact that both abortion rates are up and prisoner numbers are down, and they corrolate this to the fact that poor people are criminals, and poor people are aborting potential criminals. All HUGE and erronious leaps of logic. The man misrepresented here who runs the radio show, used that in a far fetched scenario to illusrtate that sure, you could lower the crime rate by killing off an ethnic group, but that is NOT the way to lower CRIME. It's also not saying that one or another ethnic group are a bunch of criminals, it's stating that with less people around to comit crimes, less crimes will be commited.

He went about it very poorly, a better (ok not better, but less inflamitory) example could have been:

"If you wanted to reduce white collar crime, you could -- if that were your sole purpose -- you could abort every white male baby in this country and your crime rate would go down.

"That would be an impossibly ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your white collar crime rate would go down."

Equally as idiotic, but since most white collar crime (embezelment, extortion, fraud, etc) are commited by white males, you could draw the same parallel.

[jl9618]

And you wonder how the minority communities have such a huge drug problem. I bet its because the director of drug control policy would allow certain shipments of drugs to particualr demographic groups. Weren't there reports a while back stating how gov. agencies would flood the ghettos with cocaine?

The Govt's always had a hand in the drug trade. Not officially but you know a bunch of pockets are getting lined to look the other way. I wouldn't doubt the above sentiment.

[ckforensic]

Great posts, NW

You nailed it on the head!

[ironrice]

All I gotta say is this guy should not write his own speeches.