I was going to just ignore this because it is such a stupid non-issue, but now that I see it is all over cable news, I guess I will defend Bill Bennett because no one else will.
Bill Bennett is a pompous ass who has made a career peddling culture war bullshit. He is an avowed drug warrior, which makes me respect him even less, pretends to be a conservative while believing in the vast expansion of federal powers, and, most of all, is a hypocrite. While running around telling us what sins we should avoid and what we should be punished for, he picks and chooses his own behaviors with nary a concern about the ‘decline of western civilization.’
In other words, I don’t like him one bit.
But this Howard Dean statement (and those like it) is just stupid and more racial demagoguery:
“Bill Bennett’s hateful, inflammatory remarks regarding African Americans are simply inexcusable. They are particularly unacceptable from a leader in the conservative movement and former Secretary of Education, once charged with the well being of every American school child. He should apologize immediately. This kind of statement is hardly compassionate conservatism; rather, Bennett’s comments demonstrate a reprehensible racial insensitivity and ignorance. Are these the values of the Republican Party and its conservative allies? If not, President Bush, Ken Mehlman and the Republican Leadership should denounce them immediately as hateful, divisive and worthy only of scorn.
“As Americans, we should focus on the virtues that bring us together, not hatred that tears us apart and unjustly scapegoats fellow Americans.”
Here are the remarks:
BENNETT: All right, well, I mean, I just don’t know. I would not argue for the pro-life position based on this, because you don’t know. I mean, it cuts both — you know, one of the arguments in this book Freakonomics that they make is that the declining crime rate, you know, they deal with this hypothesis, that one of the reasons crime is down is that abortion is up. Well —
CALLER: Well, I don’t think that statistic is accurate.
BENNETT: Well, I don’t think it is either, I don’t think it is either, because first of all, there is just too much that you don’t know. 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. That would be 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.
There is nothing for him to apologize for regarding this statement. It is a statement of fact, he was not advocating it, and, in fact, he noted that it would be an “impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do.”
Similarly, if you wanted to lower the rates of obesity in the United States, you could shoot all fat people. But that would be an”impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do.”
Bill Bennet is an ass. But flailing him over this and attacking him as ‘racist’ for these remarks is petty, juvenile, and just plain wrong. In the big picture, Bill Bennett may have a lot of things to answer for, but this isn’t one of them.
*** Update ***
I am sad, but not surprised, to see Oliver peddling this bullshit.
*** Update ***
Matt Yglesias is right (Why? Because he agrees with me!). I haven’t been reading him as much lately. I need to.
*** Update ***
The Freakonomics author responds.
*** Update ***
As does Brad DeLong, who had much the same post that I did, but before me.
*** Update ***
As usual, Jeff Goldstein pulls it all together.
More here from Classical Values.
Tim F
Here comes the Larry Summers debate, v2.0.
Pardon me while I go have a beer.
Shygetz
Why did he say every black baby? Why not say every baby, period. Same point, but no racial overtones. Strictly speaking, he is probably correct, but he would also probably be correct if he said every firstborn child. It was a stupid, stupid thing to say.
John Cole
Think about it for a minute.
Horshu
“Similarly, if you wanted to lower the rates of obesity in the United States, you could shoot all fat people. But that would be an ‘impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do.'”
Fat people are, by definition, obese. Are you saying that black people are, by definition, criminals? I imagine not, but it’s a poor comparison to make.
Hippie Doug J
Now if Bennet were black and said
“if we abort every white baby in this country there would be no more White Collare Corporate crimes like Enron et. al. Of course that would be impossible, ridiculous etc…But white collar corporate crime would go down”
I could only imagine the howling and screeching your right wing conservative pals would have here on BJ. Well over 150 replies no doubt, most of which blaming the democrats and liberals for Black Bennet’s offensive comments.
Jim Allen
Of all the ways he could have put it, he picked “you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down.”
YOU think about it for a minute. It doesn’t matter what he said after that — he picked that particular wording.
Davebo
I love the way John toss in the “shoot all the fat people” line.
Says all one needs to know about his take on the subject.
But everyone knows, just as all fat people are obese, all black people are criminals.
God, I almost wish he’d go back to whining about Sheehan instead of making a total ass of himself with that statement.
Must be a West Virginia thing.
Jeff Gannon
The most disturbing thing about these comments is that these ideas actually entered his head- I would guess normal, non-racists, would never even have thoughts like these cross their mind.
We figured he was a racist, but didn’t figure he’d be stupid enough to let the cancer infecting his brain leak out on the airwaves.
Anderson
Sigh. Much as I hate to admit it, Cole is right.
See Yglesias:
(Question: how much of the correlation between black culture & crime is actually a descendent of Southern culture’s unquestionable tendency towards crime? Moving from the South into urban ghettos basically preserves the Southern mores, on this hypothesis.)
John Cole
Man, you people are quick to fucking tar people with your racist smears. No, I do not think all black people are criminals, you obtuse bastard.
This was a discussion of statistics and Freakonomics, and I could just as easily have said “You could abort all the children of poor people and lower the crime rate.”
It wasn’t an example thrown out to make the point that all black people are criminal, it was a point made to demonstrate that you could do all sorts of reprehensible things to achieve a ‘goal,’ such as a lowered crime rate.
And btw, assholes- all ‘fat’ people are not obese.
John Cole
Why do you hate to admit it? Even I get something right every now and then.
STATISTICALLY, it was bound to happen.
:)
CalDevil
Wow! Can’t believe it’s been over 2 years since the Bennett gambling tempest.
Also can’t believe that it’s been about that long that Sulli was to the right of John and others on an issue.
Times change.
Davebo
Wow John! Do you kiss your wife with that potty mouth?
You sure get frothy after making an ass of yourself don’t ya?
“It wasn’t an example thrown out to make the point that all black people are criminal”
Then if failed miserably.
Davebo
Oddly enough, your “shoot all fat people” comparison is almost exactly the kind of idiotic comparison that got Bennett in hot water to begin with.
Jim Allen
John, John, John — Bennett has to come up with some extreme example of what could be done to lower the crime rate, to make whatever pont he was trying to make, and the very first thing he pulls out of the barrel is, “you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down.”
I know Dean makes your skin crawl, but are you telling us you can’t see that Bennett’s comment (no matter what he said before and after it) demonstrates “racial insensitivity and ignorance”? Bennett left himself wide open for whatever grief he’s getting now. If you’re going to stand up there next to him, don’t whine if some of the mud gets splattered on you.
airmail
Racial overtones aside, he’s not even being consistent. He says he does agree with Freakonomics arguing that the crime rate would down because of abortion. And then goes on to say that if you aborted this segment of society that that he knows the crime would go down. So which is it. Crime and abortion are linked or not.
John Cole
Yeah, it is real odd. Almost uncanny. Two reductio ad absurdum arguments take on the same form and confuse the living shit out of the same person.
You.
Shygetz
I thought about it, and I still can’t see any innocent reason to single out black babies for abortion to lower crime. Why don’t you spell it out for me, John.
Lines
Sorry Cole, Bennett is a racist ass, his comment was made with the unspoken suggestion that all black people are criminals, and THATS what makes this an issue.
But instead of seeing that, you quickly jump up and say “but he said it would be a morally bad thing!”.
I say he didn’t need to say it at all. Saying it is what makes him a racist. The stat that he’s going off of is that as abortion rates climbed through the 50’s and 60’s, there was direct corrolating evidence that the crime rate dropped at the same rate at time T. He’s the one that took that one step further and went racist with it. You can parse and nitpick, but Bennett is just like all his other “morally superior” Conservatives at the core, this is just more proof.
airmail
Sorry, my post should have said that he does not agrees with Freakonomics.
DougJ
What are the odds he’ll get fired for this? Anyone care to make a bet?
DougJ
The thing is, Project Nothing, that whatever John thinks about Bill Bennett, all discussion of this hurts the former drug czar. It doesn’t matter whether you defend or condemn him. There’s no way to say “Bill Bennett discussed the possibility of aborting all black babies” that doesn’t make Bennett look bad.
Cyrus
Two problems here, really. First of all, there’s the question of whether black people, even after you have controlled for income, single-parent status, (and the cultural/psychological effects of having been ghettoized, but that is so much harder to measure there might be no point), etc., commit a disproportionate number of crimes. If they do, then what he said is, in a strict and narrow sense, true. However, if they don’t and he believes they do, then he’s demonstrating a false belief in a negative racial stereotype. Which is much more precise and moderate and much less emotionally charged than the R-word, but it boils down to the same thing.
The second issue is, this is his idea of crime-fighting? Genocide by abortion? I mean, if someone asked me or you for a way to reduce crime, we wouldn’t come up with this. Even if they said that we have infinite money and resources and could write and repeal any law we wanted, we still wouldn’t think of this. Even if they added that reducing crime was our only priority, regardless of any ethical concerns or secondary consequences, there’s a good chance we still wouldn’t think of this. We just don’t think like that on our own. So what kind of a person does Bennett have to be to think of this while talking about another subject and just throw it out there?
Maybe you’re right that “racist” is unfair to him. But the neighbor that my family had a property line dispute with for four years, Armando at DailyKos, Severus Snape – they are asses. Calling Bennett an ass is unfair to them.
Davebo
I’m not the least bit confused John.
You seem to be making this much more complicated than it really is.
And of course there’s the frothing.. can’t forget that.
jobiuspublius
Ok, put on your reading comprehension hat folks. Bennet says that he doesn’t know that it’s true that one of the reasons crime is down is that abortion is up. But, he KNOWS THAT IT’S TRUE that if you aborted BLACK BABIES then the crime rate would go down.
Abortion in general? Don’t know. Abortion for BLACK BABIES, oh yes, that will definately work. Bennet suckered you highly distractable fools with all sorts of nice language to hide his self generated contradiction and his certainty.
If he had spoken of babies in general, he would have contradicted himself directly and more half wits would have caught him. But, since he said something outrageous and put out some mealy mouthed disclaimers, in a reasonable tone of voice, he suckered more fools because it’s more complicated that way. It can be parsed to anyone’s satisfaction and some people don’t want to believe that such a nice sounding person is such a horror.
One more bit of Bennet non-sense:
And if he knew?
BTW, the House voted to neuter the endangered species act yesterday. The cronies are still in office trying to kill our rights, our security, grab power, etc.
BumperStickerist
Shy –
the comment was made in response to Freakonomics, which makes the initial claim that ‘Abortion explains a lower crime rate’ – Bennett’s claim, as a pro-lifer, is that the claim is not justified – further, that claims like ‘lowered crime rates justify abortion’ are non-starters.
What got Bennett notices was following the line of reasoning to its logical conclusion – If *all* you’re concerned about is ‘lowering the crime rate’, (and if you listen to the audio it’s clear that Bennett is stressing that conditional} THEN you can make a case that aborting all black infants would most directly lower the crime rates, given the disproportionate percentage of crime committed by black adults.
So – don’t justify abortion by its societal benefits.
btw – this argument happened 12 years ago when the Japanese Minister of Education explained his country’s high test scores relative to America’s by saying {paraphrased} ‘Well, we don’t have blacks in Japan’
Which is both true (in the sense of not statistically significant) and relevant. America has broader national challenges to educational policies than other, smaller, less diverse countries.
So, you could factor in how a group of US students similar to that in Japan (or Switzerland) performed on a given test, and the US rankings would jump significantly.
Or we can just bitch about things.
DougJ
You may not like it, but is *is a plan*. Where’s the Democrats’ plan to lower crime?
ppGaz
Yes he is.
So, if there’s a culture war, and he pops a quote like the one on the table now, what did people expect? Tsk, tsks?
IT’S A WAR. Bennett is an icon of that war. He’s going to take major heat for his gaffe, and why shouldn’t he? Why does this surprise anybody? He deserves every bit of outrage, scorn and ridicule that he gets. Why is this even the topic of a thread?
Shygetz
Bumper–If that was his innocent reason, then he is a fool, a terrible speaker, and a poor social scientist.
Fool–He should know that his words sounded bad and would come back to haunt him.
Terrible speaker–He did not say that aborting black babies would be the most direct way to lower crime rates; he said that aborting black babies would lower crime rates. This leaves the audience to guess as to whether he thinks that aborting other babies would lower crime rates, or if only abortion of black babies would do it.
Poor social scientist–He should know that the fact that a disproportionate ratio of crime is commited by black people is largely due to the fact that a disproportionate ratio of blacks occupy the lowest socioeconomic levels of society. He should also know that, if we killed all black people, someone else would move down into the lowest SES levels (fact of life in capatalistic economy). Therefore, the largest impetus for crime would just transfer onto another group.
Bennett is either a racist at heart, or just really stupid and bad at his job (or both). I can’t tell which, and I really don’t care.
rayabacus
As of 2003 (last statistics available) the rate of illegitimate births to black mothers is 68%. That is, 68% of all black births are to unmarried women.
As of 2002 (last statistics available) unemployment in males (all males – black & white) between the ages of 20-24 yrs old is 30%. This does not include those incarcerated.
Just statistics – no analyses or opinions.
Shygetz
rayabacus–Was there a point to those statistics that I missed?
Defense Guy
That is the Democrats’ plan. They are the ‘pro-choice’ party. Get your snark ideologically aligned man!
Steve
I accept that the crime rate is higher among black people. But it hardly follows that they commit crimes BECAUSE they are black.
The point some of you are making – that he was just trying to make some abstract, theoretical observation that has no relevance to anything – just highlights the fact that it was an incredibly stupid comment. Of course he wasn’t advocating genocide, but that doesn’t make it inoffensive to casually mention that genocide would have its good points as well as its bad ones.
Shygetz
The Democrats are equal-opportunity baby killers. The Republicans are affirmative action baby killers.
Lines
Damn Shygetz, that was an awesome observation!
Defense Guy
Except of course the Republicans are by and large anti-abortion whereas the Democrats are pro-abortion.
jobiuspublius
No, he claims that he doesn’t know.
How is it logical to conclude that aborting a segment of the population(genocide) is known to lower crime after first having claimed that it is not known that abortion will lower crime?
Proof?
RSA
There’s nothing wrong with Bennett’s logic; it’s with his rhetoric. Imagine if he’d said, “But I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce violence in the Middle East, you could—if that were your sole purpose, you could kill every Jew in Israel, and your rate of violence would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your violence would go down.” Lovely. The obesity example John gives isn’t quite right. It would be closer to say you could reduce obesity by shooting all lower-income Americans. You might imagine that poor people would be upset by the implied association, which gets at another issue, which is what Bennett’s listeners make from such statements.
Doug
Bennett is a dumbass. He could’ve made exactly the same point using the hypothetical of aborting “every poor child” or aborting “every child of a single-mother”. He may not have intended anything pernicious, but he’s put himself on a tall, narrow pedestal, and we’re gonna have us some fun knocking him down.
Shygetz
DefenseGuy-My remark was given in the same snarky spirit as your rejoinder to DougJ. See, the humor hinged upon the topic of this thread, Bennett’s “modest proposal” to abort all black babies. Sorry if it wasn’t taken that way.
Defense Guy
If you don’t jump to the racist conclusion, then by the simple math of the population declining, the crime rate would go down as well, theoretically. I have no way of knowing if the man is a racist, but the simple fact that he used the word black, as opposed to white, or Hispanic, or Asian, does not in and of itself make the man a racist. The fact that he calls the idea morally reprehensible would seem to indicate that he thinks the idea is morally reprehensible, but then, he could be lying.
Defense Guy
ShyGetz
OK. Thanks.
DougJ
Will the mandatory abortion program be carried out by a federal agency or will it left to state and local officials? Because, if you ask me, this is just the sort of thing that *should* be overseen by a former horse breeder.
Shygetz
Then, DefenseGuy, why say any race at all. You could say all babies if you truly wanted reductio ad absurdum, or you could say first-born children, or kids named John, or anything. But if you choose a race other than your own, then you open yourself up for being questioned as a racist. I can’t believe people are sitting here defending this guy when AT BEST he said something abyssally stupid and insensitive on his radio show that had predictable fallout, and as such deserves the criticism he gets.
Defense Guy
DougJ
Of course it will need to be run out of the state of LA, as the effectivness rates of horse breeding disaster agency heads increases in the warm sunshine state of FL.
Defense Guy
Shygetz
Of course then you remove the authors intent as the primary source of context and replace it with whichever listner decides to take affront. In that case, no one should ever say anything ever except of course ‘double plus good’ or ungood as the case warrents.
jobiuspublius
Are you saying that genocide is not a crime or violent?
DougJ
Not when it’s *compassionate* genocide.
Tim F
hic.
jobiuspublius
Or, every n-th baby, but, that would itself be a crime. So, it’s a contradiction, and not his only one.
Andrei
And what does that do for you? Point out just how little you understand of what it’s like living in the hellhole of poverty (earning less than $10,000 a year) in our country on the edges of many of our modern cities? How completely and utterly assassine.
I love how you attempted to call out Howard Dean for being in the wrong in this post. That particular tactic failed miserably, as this thread has largely become about how stupid Bennett is for making such a ridiculously assassine statement. And rightly so I might add.
jobiuspublius
BTW, Larry Franklin pled guilty to violations of the Espionage Act and somone suspects that Rover and friends could go down that road too.
DougJ
jobius, all the stuff Franklin told AIPAC is in Who’s Who too. So don’t get too excited.
John S.
Well, John has to keep reminding us of all the ‘despicable’ things Democrats do that keep him voting for ethically challenged Republicans.
Shygetz
Oh please. I don’t care if you love the black man and have nothing but the best intent, you call him a fried chicken-eating nigger and you will get what you deserve. There are certain things that are obviously dumb to say because they state or imply certain pejorative aspects onto a section of the community that are not deserved. Bill Bennett said one of those things. He either knew that what he was saying was pejorative and therefore meant it, or he didn’t know that it would be offensive. If he meant it like that, he’s a racist. If he didn’t mean it like that, he’s a huge dumbass for saying it.
Of course, you know all of this. You’re not stupid. You probably see this as an instance of PC-gone-wild (which Republicans are generally against) as opposed to taking responsibility for one’s words and actions (which Republicans claim to be for, and which this clearly is).
jobiuspublius
But, wouldn’t that be a crime? Wasn’t Bennet saying that genocide would reduce crime?
neil
John is probably sad, but not surprised, to see Scott McClellan peddling this bullshit, mmm?
Steve
Heh, Scott McClellan says “The president believes the comments were not appropriate.” How many times has this Administration distanced itself from statements made by Republicans? Not a lot.
I think John picked the wrong battle to fight.
Slartibartfast
Hey, what the hell. If you took every other person outside and shot them in the head, there wouldn’t be an oil crisis.
Flail away, people.
slide
John exculpates the degenerate gambler’s racist remark with this comment:
so Bennett should be cut some slack because he is against genocide. Not a very high bar for republicans is it?
Shygetz
See, nothing wrong with what Slartibartfast said. He didn’t imply that one group had an inherent character flaw in making his argument–he said that if you killed every other person, there would be no oil crisis. If Bennett had said that you could abort every other baby and reduce crime, we would not be here talking about it. But he had to bring race into the equation, which was either racist or stupid or both.
rilkefan
Just chiming in to agree with John on this one.
Oh, and, just for fun, linking to JMM on a major Republican mover/shaker’s close connection to a mob hit.
John Cole
You people are certifiable.
Bennett never said that black people are inherently likely to be criminals. Period.
He took two commonly known and reported statistics, one being the freakonomics association with abortion and a drop in crime rate 20 years later, the other that blacks are incarcerated at a much higher rate than non-blacks, and, in an ARGUMENT AGAINST ABORTION, noted that if you aborted all black babies, you would have a reduced crime rate.
And he noted that that would be immoral, reprehensible, and wrong. Bennett doesn’t want ANY babies aborted. His point was that you simply ahould not use utilitarian logic regarding abortion.
You guys are adding your own luggage and baggage to his statement. This isn’t a discussion about the ‘inherent’ wualities of any group- blacks are simply incarcerated at a higher rate, whether that be because of racism, poverty, what is called ‘environmental racism’, lack of economic opportunity, disaprity insentencing laws (crack v. cocaine), etc.
Now, as to whether or not he should have said it, I would argue he should not have. Why?
Because of all the idiots in the world who would intentionally or untintentionally misunderstand him. But he has nothing to apologize for…
Clever
Regardless of what Bennett meant, it was a thoughtless stereotyping that could have been done without. Any time you single out an ethnenticity or race and make a blanket statement such as Bennett’s, you’re asking for a thump up side the head [verbal or actual] as it seems waaay too much like scapegoating and IS giving an implicit label to an entire race of people.
It was irresponsible and thoughtless, and in the least, he should apologize for poor word choice.
Just to prove my point, exchange “black” with “republican” and “crime” with “stupidity” and see if you think its offensive. Could flip “republican” with “democrat” and get the same reaction from a different camp.
slide
All of the following are arguably statements of fact as well.
.
Andrei
I’ll bite Slarti!
If we aborted all minority children, then we could get rid of Equal Opportunity Laws. No more having to give hand outs to people of race who aren’t smarter than their white counterparts.
If we aborted all middle class people’s children, then we could stop worrying about paying them when they grow up. Corporate America needs to be given some slack to use cheaper labor over seas as it is.
If we aborted babies of Republican voting mothers, then we could finally lose the audience that allows Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter and Sean Hannity to exist.
This can be sort of fun! Let’s call this new standard “The Bennett Abortion Metric.” We now have a way to measure how to solve problems! We can simply discuss whether if we abort fetuses of some certain part of the population, that we’ll also be better for it! Statistically or theoretically spekaing of course.
Come on people… pile on! My examples kind of suck. I need DougJ’s brilliance here.
Another Jeff
Bingo.
Slartibartfast
What about the tendency of people (Americans, especially!) in general to tap our vital fluids by operating motor vehicles, when quite clearly not everyone does?
slide
Cole:
No but he did say they are inherently MORE likely to be criminals or his statement would not have been true as you have said John. If blacks were no more likely to be criminals, aborting all black babies would have no effect on the crime rate. The crime rate can only be reduced if one assumes that the black baby is more likely to committ a crime than all other babies.
Not very good at logic are you John?
Slartibartfast
And boy, did you.
I’ve got another: you could take the people on the other side of this argument outside and shoot them, and the collective IQ of the D party would rise.
Not that I would advocate doing such a thing, mind you.
jobiuspublius
But, what if he said that I could abort other peoples babies? Wouldn’t we be talking about it? Why is it ok for Bennets’a caller to abort other peoples babies and not me? Why not me dammit? Why can’t I be the Aborter in Chief?
P.S. Shygetz, I’m not mocking you. I agree with you, more or less.
Slartibartfast
And similar. There’s always data. You’d think Google hadn’t been invented yet.
slide
Yes, Slartibartfast, we all know that blacks committ a disproportionate number of crimes. But is that a result of their being black? or more likely the fact that a disproportionate number of blacks are poor and the crime rate is much higher for those on the lower end of the economic spectrum. So Bennett’s comment singles out the baby’s color as opposed to the baby’s economic condition which is the determining factor. That is why some may view it as racist, whether the statement is empirically true or not.
I know this is a little nuanced for you but try and follow ok?
Andrei
He shouldn’t have said it not because it was wrong but because people just wouldn’t “get it”? He shouldn’t apologize for making such a ridiculously assassine and callous comment? In fact, Howard Dean is the one who’s wrong here, ladies and gentlemen!
You are a fool.
Horshu
We can parse the semantics of what Bennett said till the end of time, but ultimately, from a pragmatic standpoint, it was just a foolish thing to say. Durbin, Santorum, et al. should know this point, as it is similar to the various permutations of the Hitler/Nazi (yay, Godwin’s Law!) comparisons they would make: from a purely factual or comparative view, what they say is correct to an extent insofar as comparisons between two subjects with similar (such as being able to draw comparisons between Iraq and Vietnam without arguing total equivalency) characteristics, but common sense tells us that even bringing the issue up is going to anger/offend/outrage individuals. You have to expect that when you make a statement that touches on something as loaded as race relations, you will set off a firestorm. And that is Bennett’s biggest screwup here: he focused on the semantical correctness rather than the political correctness on an issue with over 200 years of bad blood behind it, and when you do that, right or wrong, you had better be prepared to duck and duck often.
DougJ
You know, there’s some strange part of me that likes Bill Bennett. I think it’s the gambling that appeals to me, that and the way he always looks so grumpy. And I think he didn’t do anything that wrong here. He was just trying to prove a point.
But when you write a book called the Book Of Virtues, you deserve whatever abuse comes your way. Am I right?
I also think that he may be a member of Opus Dei.
jobiuspublius
And if every black baby were aborted by “you”, Bennet’s caller:
1) That would be genocide. Genocide is criminal, so the crime rate would go up, not down, at least in the short term.
2) Someone else would take their place, so, there goes the long term argument for genocide.
Yet, no one seems to be able to answer this. How is it that Bennet does not know if general abortion reduces crime, but, he knows that genocide reduces crime?
Mike
“John S. Says:
Well, John has to keep reminding us of all the ‘despicable’ things Democrats do that keep him voting for ethically challenged Republicans.”
John votes in Texas now?
Cause otherwise your comment is well…stupid.
John Cole
A.) I am not one to correct spelling, since I mess things up so frequently myself, but the word you are looking for is
asinine.
B.) No, he shouldn’t apologize for making a statement you don’t understand.
C.) Howard Dean is simply playing the racial demagogue, and the thrust of this post (no matter how hard you try) is not that ‘Howard Dean was wrong,’ but that Bill Bennett was not wrong. Howard Dean was just the first person I saw on google news denouncing Bennett.
D.) I hate Bill Bennett.
Defense Guy
That really says it all right there. It sums up what I was talking about earlier. The intent of the author must take a backseat to the perception of the reader, which is wrong. With the usual caveats for ownership of words which may be used freely by certain groups, and not at all by others.
jobiuspublius
Do we? The link Slarti provides talks about incarceration.
Slartibartfast
You just can’t not be the giant dork, here, can you? Look, if Bennett had said abort all poor babies, you’d also get a reduction in crime rate. Same kind of logical connection, but I doubt there’d be cries of racism until someone noted that black people are more likely to be poor, so we’d be aborting those poor black babies in a greater proportion…
Insanity, I say. Correlation ain’t causation, but if you winnow the population of population group X that is more highly correlated with activity A than is population group Y, then you WILL get a decrease in activity A, and you likely will get a decrease in the rate of activity A. This is what correlation doesn’t imply causation means; it doesn’t mean that (in this instance) being black is itself a cause of criminal activity, but it does mean that blacks are more likely to become criminals.
Let’s take the whole aborting business out of the picture. Is it, or is it not a fact that if the US chose to only take statistics on, say, Asian SAT scores, that our nation’s median SAT score would rise? Is that racism, or is that just the facts?
Now, of course it’s more complicated than that. Of course. That’s just one (but not an important one) of the many, many reasons this was and always will be a hypothetical.
slide
Cole:
One definition of WRONG: Unacceptable or undesirable according to social convention.
Bennett was as WRONG as they come.
Slartibartfast
Unless the false conviction, evasion and escape ratio(s) is/are…well, HUGE, you don’t have a point. Sure, incarceration rate isn’t the same as crime rate, but it’s enough to make the point. Unless you’ve got some evidence to the contrary, which might be interesting.
p.lukasiak
John, are you really that much of a racist that you don’t know how racist that statement is?
Babies don’t commit crimes. So unless you happen to believe that black babies are genetically pre-disposed to criminal behavoir as adults, what Bennett said was COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY RACIST.
jg
He paraphrased a study that said abortion lowers the crime rate since most women seeking abortion are single or in poverty which is a cause of crime. He turned it into a racist statement by saying you could abort all the black babies to lower crime. And he’s being defended?
Durbins remarks weren’t this bad.
Even if you could stretch your brain to the thought that what he said is somewhat factually acurate, he still shouldn’t have said it. At the least he should apologize to those who won’t get the full background on what he said.
If I was black I would definately want to punch this guy right in his eye. Repeatedly.
When a republican says something outrageous we have to relax and really understand what he said, it wasn’t that bad. If a dem says something, holy hell its time for a sedition trial. To the gallows!
DougJ
As much as I like to see Bennett take some crap for the whole virtue thing, the side of me that hates to see people get pilloried for saying something that merely sounds bad must agree with John. I’m so tired of this sort of thing. I hope that this whole cultural thing of all but criminalizing free speech is in its last throes.
jobiuspublius
That is the point. It’s harder to create a BLACK = CRIMANAL sterotype when you tell it like it is rather than take short cuts.
DougJ
I would advise the Dems here to keep their powder dry. We’re going to see a lot of very powerful members of Congress and the White House get indicted over the next few months. Don’t lose your focus and waste your energy complaining about the ill-advised comments of a gambling-addicted virtue mongerer.
Lines
Why is it that no matter how many people that decry Bennett’s comment as “racist”, there will be those that blame those people for reading it wrong. What if those that are claiming its racist are RIGHT?
John, are you defending the general accusation made against Conservatives that they are racist by trying to parse Bennett’s words? Is that really where your defense comes from? I can understand that, but it only means that its Party before Logic, before Evidence, before Compassion.
The vast majority here say it was racist of him to say, but instead of conceeding, your argument just gets more and more heel dragging stubborn. An apology from Bennett would be simple, it could easily calm the noise. Why shouldn’t he take the high road and apologize for misspeaking? Sure most liberals would still come to the conclusion that he’s only apologizing because he got caught, but thats the politics of the last 6 years.
jobiuspublius
And, Slarti, there is also the issue of targeting.
jobiuspublius
Very wise and true. But, can we have Bennet as an appatiser?
slide
Slartibartfast if you had read my post a little more carefully, you would have seen that I said the statement may have been been empirically true but still racist. The determining factor that would make an individual more or less likely to become a criminal has to do with economics and not race. When Bennett improperly (in my opinion) injected race into the crime rate statement he commited the classic case of racism which is defined as:
If he had said abort babies of poor people, there may still have been an outcry for other reasons but no one could have accused him of racism.
DougJ
*YOU’RE ALL A BUNCH OF RACISTS*
Shygetz
I never said that what he said was factually incorrect (read the second post in the thread), but that it was a stupid thing to say. He either said it because he’s a moron, or because he is racist, or both. Either way, he shouldn’t have said it. And no, I guess if he’s a moron he doesn’t have to apologize for it. Him being a moron is punishment enough.
DefenseGuy–Give me a friggin’ break. A public figure can say whatever he wants without consequence so long as he means well (“With the usual caveats for ownership of words which may be used freely by certain groups, and not at all by others”)? Luckily for you, I’ve read a ton of dumb stuff from commenters on this website, or else I’d have to nominate that. Repeat after me–words mean things. And if you say something stupid, regardless of what was going on in your innermost heart of hearts, you’re going to reap the whirlwind.
RSA
Jobiuspublius writes,
Good point; I hadn’t seen it from that perspective. There is a logic problem there.
DougJ
Can’t you liberals see the hypocrisy of favoring legalized abortion while and opposing genocide?
srv
But I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce hypocrisy, you could—if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every evangelical baby in this country, and your hyprocrisy rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your hyprocrisy rate would go down.
Lines
Is it too late to abort them once they become Young Republicans?
At least that might stop the Illconceived War problem.
ppGaz
No, the rule is that if a Republican gets tied up in words, it’s an honest mistake, but if a Dem does it, he’s Aiding and Abetting the Enemy, or Dishonoring our Troops, or Playing the Blame Game … or whatever marketing phrase works that day.
When Dean yelled in a room full of screaming people (who never heard him, even though he was trying to be heard over them) and the TV audio made it sound like he was just yelling like a lunatic ….. you were right there to defend him, right DG? Because it was his INTENT that mattered, right?
When George Bush said BRING IT ON he was really referring to some luggage he wanted brought onto Air Force One, right?
STFU, man. You guys think you can play both sides of the word game street, and nobody is going to pay attention.
Live by the sword, die by the sword, baby. Fuck Bennett. He will roast in the fires of public scorn, and it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
slide
is this emperically true?
is it also racist?
Clever
The perception of the reader is not what troubles me, its the perception of Bill Bennett. If his intent was to be percieved as a pompus, stereotyping jackass, well, he did a hell of a job. If he wanted his point to be widely accepted, he should choose his words a little better.
Its not the substance of what he said [abortion/crime rate tie together], its the delivery of his point. Could have been better, and I bet he knows and understands that. I with the Freakonomics guy [see JC’s link above] in that it was live TV, so it was off the cuff…still not that good an excuse for what he said, but does give leeway. If it was an op/ed and he wrote the same line, I would be much less considerate.
Slartibartfast
Ok, that’s one of the most tragically stupid things I’ve seen this week.
Oh, and here’s why: you don’t understand correlation. It doesn’t matter if crime has to do with economics and not race; if economic situation causes crime and is correlated to race, then crime and race are correlated as a result. Nobody (not even Bennett) is saying that crime is caused by race. Please, read some statistics.
And that’s it for me.
Defense Guy
Be fair, only white Republican males can be racists.
ppGaz
Go ahead and show where I took an opposite position on any of that crap you list. Perhaps you are just attempting to display what I stated earlier, that it is more important to place how YOU feel about the words spoken, then the intent of the author.
What’s more, the only way this game can be played is to completely ignore the man’s next words. Cherry pick for effect. Have at it.
Defense Guy
Strawman. As I just said, the only way this outrage can even take place if you ignore his next lines. So from now on, every sentence spoken by every person for the rest of time must be able to stand completely on it’s own. Have Bill Maher add that to his new rules.
slide
you know in a way I would agree with you, I dont’ think everyone should be pilloried for every utterance not particularly well thought out, but in this case Bennett has not retracted, modified, corrected or apologized for what he said. As a matter of fact he is demanding apologies from those that attacked him. So any “leeway” I may have afforded him is no longer operable. He is a detestable windbag bloviating all the time on other people morals and virtues but god forbid anyone look at his morals and virtues.
ppGaz
That’s a fine theory, as long as you are happy with stating that no speaker has any responsibility to make himself understood. All understanding is on the shoulders of the listener.
Uh, no. Sorry. The world doesn’t work that way. It would be convenient for you if it did, because you’d never have to take responsibility for anything you said … sort of like the way you do now.
But that isn’t the way the game is played, as Mr. Bennet will now learn. You won’t, but he will.
Justin Gardner
John, I really like your blog, but you’re wrong about this one. I blogged about the “Bill Bennett black babies” story yesterday in fact.
This is from the post you linked to from Steven Levitt, author of Freakonomics.
This is an incredibly important distinction, and one which I don’t know has been made yet in the 106 comments (didn’t have time to read them).
Bennett’s remarks were not right because “black babies” are a subset of “babies”. And if he doesn’t believe higher abortion rates results in lower crime rates, then how in the hell could he believe that aborting all black pregnancies would result in a lower crime rate.
Those two thoughts DO NOT add up at all, and instead of defending these obviously racist remarks, he should back down immediately.
jg
Bullshit. Its racist because he paraphrased a report that did not specifically say black babies. He said black babies, he singled them out. His next sentence doesn’t fix that. He chose to remove white babies from the equation.
I’m not saying Bennet hates blacks but he did fuck up and a simple apology will go a long way.
Durbin was forced to apologize.
ppGaz
What’s fascinating, Slide, is to watch these weasels take the opposite tack when it suits their purpose. Today, it’s Bennet’s “intent” that matters. Tomorrow, it will the words themselves, not the intent, that matters. All depending on which team has the ball at the moment.
These guys are so lame, you’d laugh if you didn’t have to cry.
Tim F
I believe that we should avoid condemning Bennett for making an argument that he in fact was arguing against.
It is less clear to me whether Bennett thinks that the argument is wrong, or merely immoral. This is an important point. If he thinks that the argument is simply wrong then the noise is unjustified. On the other hand if Bennett wants to claim that the argument, while immoral and impractical, is essentially right then he opens himself up to the criticisms that I think are best made by the Freakonomics author to whom John links.
ppGaz
For those of you who need a code card:
Durbin = The words, not the intent, mattered.
Bennett = The intent, not the words, mattered.
Durbin = D
Bennett = R
Are there any questions?
There WILL BE a quiz.
slide
Slartibartfast said:
His comment implies that. Eliminate blacks and you have reduced crime. How the fuck else can you read that? When he picked out a segment of the population to wipe off of the planet in order to reduce crime he used race as the selection criteria (black babies). You can talk about correlation all you want but that is what the man said.
jobiuspublius
Thank you John Cole for the Freakonomics link:
There! I am too smart for you old people to appreciate, I young jobiuspublius.
How does Bennet arrive at such a contradiction? Because he is a racist.
Maybe Bennet should read Freakonomics.
ppGaz
The parimutuel odds on Bennett issuing an apology:
2:3
Step right up, ladeeeez and gentlemen. Place your bets.
John Cole
Well, you shouldn’t be giving it, because you would fail.
:)
I defended Durbing vehemently and loudly, and tend to make my judgements on what people actually say, rather than what you guys think they ‘meant.’ Or their political affiliation.
ppGaz
I was after DG, not you, John.
slide
ppGaz you’re right, the Republican party should rename itself the Hypocrite party. Never have I ever seen a bigger group of hypocrites in my life. I was reminded of that yesterday listening to DeLay talking about out of control partisan prosecutors… hello….. Ken Starr ring a bell…. anybody remember him…. and what did Delay have to say back then?…
over a blow job.
Hypocrites
Steve S
Well, I do concur that this is much about nothing. What Bennett said is no different than some of the stuff Howard Dean has said, or the example of Dick Durbin which were grossly taken out of context and pummeled as nonsense.
That’s politics.
Actually I was going to note, some of the comments I’ve seen argued that Bennett’s problem was he linked race to poverty. Yet when I go around preaching that Democrats ought to stop linking poverty to race, I get told to shut up. So I think this shows an even larger problem within the Democratic party.
Still, this is nowhere near as ridiculous as what the right did to Dick Durbin, or Howard Dean, or Wesley Clark, or John Kerry. Swiftboat liars for Bush, anyone?
jg
Still the most important question has yet to be asked. So I’ll ask it.
Should A-Rod win the MVP over David Ortiz?
I say NO!
ppGaz
I’ve NEVER talked that much over a blow job.
About anything.
Never.
Hippie Doug J
Defense Guy Says:
YOU’RE ALL A BUNCH OF RACISTS
Be fair, only white Republican males can be racists.
Excellent point Defense Guy! Now if we could only abort all white male republican fetuses then we can eliminate racism. And corporate crime too. No more Enrons, ah to live that dream…
ppGaz
Satire.
DG has never made an excellent point in his life.
jobiuspublius
Finally, I am not alone here. I’ve been the only one hammering that point here. Not to mention that “you” aborting all those babies would itself be a crime.
slide
You mouth was occupied?
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Another Jeff
This thread has moved so far away from anything about what Bennett said that it’s almost pointless to try and argue about it anymore.
It’s reason #576 why you’ll never be able to have an intelligent conversation about race with some white liberals.
So, I’ll just let ppgaz and Slide continue with their circle-jerk.
sean
I do know that if you aborted every Puerto Rican baby then Ortiz would win the MVP.
ppGaz
Oh yeah? Which part of this did you not get:
Jeff Altemus
While it’s clear that Bennett’s quote can be isolated and taken out of context to sound worse than it is. And it’s clear that he was using an extreme example to make a point (which doesn’t make him a racist). Still, implicit in what he says is the suggestion that blacks are more prone to criminal behavior. Which suggests to me a little latent bigotry at the very least. Even if Bennett’s not a racist, he sure comes across sounding like one.
Furthermore, based on the above excerpt, he’s the one who introduced race. Looks to me like the discussion was about abortion, not abortion in the black community.
This doesn’t strike me as one of those (countless) cases of people jumping unfairly on something someone said based on an out-of-context quote or hypersensitive PCness. This is some guy—an a moralist windbag to boot—stepping in a shitpile of his own making.
slide
Another Jeff:
yes…. and your total contribution to the thread was:
Whew… you’re right, we could never keep up with your intellectual prowess.
Defense Guy
Another thing to mention is that the constant jump to cries of ‘racism’ will have the side effect of no one listening to you when real racism does pop up. So, where are the other racist saying by Bennett. If he is one, this will hardly be the first time it’s come out.
ppGaz
You should talk. You’re so partisan you probably go mad with rage at the mere sight of the color red. Hell man, you probably ripped out the page in the dictionary with the word Republican in it.
I understand why you can’t see intelligence, having been imbued in your little partisan hatefest for so long. Back to you…
John S.
Mike-
So only Republicans from Texas are corrupt?
That comment is well…stupid.
slide
I dont’ know about anybody else, but I never called Bennett a racist. I said his comment was racist, even if that was not what he intended. I have no evidence that Bennett is a racist. A bloviating windbag degenerate gambler hypocrite yes.. but racist? as Bush says with evolution, the jury is still out on that one.
Andrei
LOL. Thanks for the correction. Indeed I was looking for that word.
What don’t I understand?
A) A study was done — one that Bennett didn’t agree with — connecting an increase in abortion rate to a drop in crime rate.
B) The largest prisoner population we have in this country are black males.
C) Bennett — and you — seem to think that a case can be made that aborting black fetuses, due to their high population in the prison system, the net result would be a decrease in crime.
D) You make this claim without any way to prove it unless you actually acted on it. (Providing a nice cover for your “theorectical” discussion).
Look, you may think you have a theorectical basis to stand on a claim that aborting black babies might drop the crime rate, but you will never know until you did it, no matter how likley or logical it might appear on the surface in your “I’m always right” type A brain. Until then, those two pieces of statistical information are unrelated. Further, the problem of crime, race, economic class and politics is IMHO sufficiently complex that to tie one statistic to a completely unrelated statistic is absurd.
You’re digging in on this issue makes you look more like just an asshole than a fool. Maybe a bit of both.
DougJ
John, when will you admit that you’re a racist, homophobic hyopcrite, a defender of baby eaters, a spouter of talking points, a hater of America? You’re not fooling anyone. We all know it’s true. So just come out and admit already.
ppGaz
Translation: I’m right, and you got nothin.
ppGaz
Democrats do not deface books. That’s a Republican trait.
Sorry. Next?
slide
He’ll wear your insults like a badge on honor.
ppGaz
Not exactly. A couple of guys just ran some numbers and said, here’s what they point to.
But Bennett is the one who came along and, for reasons only he will ever know, decided to put both of his feet and his legs and his dick in his mouth and bite down hard. Probably because he is such an arrogant ass that he thinks he can say anything and get away with it, because after all, he lectures us about virtue. I mean, who are we little people to criticize, or even characterize, anything he says?
The man is a moral and intellectual abomination, and he now finds out what his arrogance is really going to cost him.
He will apologize; the betting windows are open.
What’s really hilarious here is that anyone would take anything this man says seriously enough to care about it.
jobiuspublius
Bennet shouldn’t appologize because he would be stealing the lime light from Delay, Franklin, and all the other criminal America Hater’s in and about our government and media.
ppGaz
Still time to place those bets.
Bennett will apologize, and soon, according to my sources close to the collossal fuckup.
Andrei
Indeed. I was being overzealous in my attempt at snark, but you are right, “study” was entirely an inappropriate choice of words on my part.
John Cole
Thank you, Mr. Hume. Every time I have gone out in the rain without an umbrella in the past 35 years, I have gotten wet. But, according to you, I can’t tell if I will get wet the NEXT time.
My poor type A brain…
ppGaz
I know, and I wasn’t really quibbling with that. I was just pointing out how completely unprovoked and stupid Bennett’s gaffe really is. This is ALL about him, and his ego.
What sparked Bennett is that the book “Freakonomics” is getting a lot of buzz these days, and nobody is sniffing around Bennett’s butt for a good scold like they used to. He was just Jonesin’ for some I Gotta Be Me time, and probably had a listener pimp the question to him to give him a chance to speak. So thrilled was he to hear his own voice, he just forgot to put his brain in gear first.
Like I said, couldn’t have happened to a nicer (that is, shittier, less honest, less important) motherf — I mean, guy.
Defense Guy
I have never defaced a Bible in my life. I am outraged by your suggestion.
Oh, you mean OTHER books.
Sinner.
ppGaz
I am outraged at your outrage.
Only more so.
Andrei
Wow… so in the past, you’ve aborted all the black babies to notice a decrease in the crime rate? Or wait… you mean, there’s been an scientific experiment that proves for a fact that aborting black babies will decrease the crime rate gauranteed?
John Cole
NO, Andrei- but crime statistics have african-americans incarcerated at a significantly disproportionate level to their reletaive precentage of the population, and that has been the case for years. Extrapolate from that, absence any major changes in policy, that would remain the same in 15-20 years- when the babies you are talking about would be in the peak years for all human beings to commit crime.
Not to mention, BENNETT IS AGAINST THIS.
Contrary to your earlier posts, I am not looking like a fool here…
Lines
Don’t forget, 9/11 changed everything. Aborting black babies might have been a forbidden subject pre-9/11, but now we just have to roll up our sleeves and do what needs to be done.
Anyone have a pitchfork?
And at least we’re turning the corner on black babies.
We’ll be greeted with black baby petals?
No one could have forseen the failure of the abortionists?
Lines
John, I hate to be the one to break it to you, man. You look like a fool. Your defense of the indefensible is pathetic and foolish.
But hey, Party above Compassion!
scs
I haven’t read all the posts, but does anyone know is there a study that compares poor white to black crime rate? Like if you adjusted for economics, would it be more equal. Also if you adjusted for urbanism, as it seems easier to commit crime when you are in a crowded area than when you are spread out in the country. Anyway, because Bennett, since he was dabbling in stats, did not say anything to adjust the stats, he made a ridiculous statement. As a public figure, he should know better. See George Bush never says stupid gaffes like this. That’s one good quality he has.
Slartibartfast
You mean, to change them from what’s currently true? That would be ridiculous.
Those studies are interesting, but inapplicable. As noted above, one could (through whatever means you choose; the abortion thing seemed and still does seem an idiotic choice) eliminate poor people from the population OR black people from the population and effect a reduction in crime rate. Stupid statement? Sure. Incorrect? Not at all. Racist? Maybe, maybe not; we cannot know without information outside of that conversation.
If, on the other hand, your point is that the facts are racist, well, run with that.
Lines
A study like that would be racist and unwelcome, sheesh!
Lines
Look, the Freakanomics studies found that the rate of change between abortion and crime appeared to have a distinct corrolation, and by taking the two together, it appears they could be logically linked, even thought just minimally.
Its almost a humorous comparison, in a sick sort of way, kind of like my reference to dead baby jokes above. Dobson, maybe because he craves attention, just took it too far, thus revealing his racist nature.
Andrei
The number of prisoners in jail is actually pretty close between whites and blacks, as cited by the government’s own studies. Note that whites now occupy the larger population of prisoners. Maybe Bennett should have considered using white babies in his example?
Note that the crime rate is increasing in larger percentage for white and hispanic males in the chart I linked. At the point in time in the future of extrapolation in your thought experiment (20 years?), the question you need to answer is simple math: Would the percentage lost in crime rate due to blacks being removed from today until the point in time 20 years from now be more than the increase as it is trending still contributed by white and hispanic males committing crimes? Further, what statistic constitues a relevant impact on the crime rate? Or are we going to be petty and claim even 1% net loss means Bennett is technically correct?
The large point outside this simple math exercise on a theorectical analysis is simple: We could probably abort any class, race or member of the population and see a decrease in the crime rate from the sheer fact of having less people. The fact Bennett used something as stupid an example with a racial specific remark just shows how prejudiced his tiny little brain is.
And you want to defend him? Like I said… Asshole.
Daren L
John C.,
As a liberal(and African-American) fan of yours I’m going to be civil and defend your willigness to defend Bennet on his statement, but I disagree with caveats. Does his statement alone make Bennett a racist? No. Do I know enough about Bennet and his past thoughts and actions to believe that he is a racist? No.
But the problem that many people have with his statements and others like him is the continous use of African-Americans as the right wing pinata. Even Ken Mehlman now admits to the “Southern Strategy” as a means to an end for the GOP. Bennett could have made that statement about the poor, or children in a one parent household, or whites or Americans overall and, but it is just a little to convenient that it had to be black people. If all black babies were aborted of course crime stats would go down, just as if Hispanic or white babies were aborted. The continued use of African-Americans as a weapon of choice for many in the GOP bothers me and alot of others. So, while I believe that Bennett had the right to say what he did, I also will not absolve him of responsibility for statements which to me show a tendency to always use whatever convenient stereotype of African-Americans they have and hammer it out home with the base.
Darren L.
John Cole
Andrei- You don;t even understand the chart you are using.
What percentage of the country are blacks?
What percentage of the prison population are they, even with the decline over the fifteen year span in that chart?
What percentage of the country is white?
What percentage of the prison population is white?
You are just wrong, no matter how many times you call me an asshole (and, for that matter DeLong and Yglesias).
Slartibartfast
Slightly larger, while comprising eighty percent of the US population. One of these things is not like the other.
Defense Guy
Andrei
The point is not the raw numbers of whites to blacks to hispanics in prison population, the point is the number as it relates to the population as a whole. The percentage of incarcerated blacks against the population of blacks is higher.
This is where you call me a racist, and an asshole if the mood suits you.
Slartibartfast
It’s not you, DG, it’s the data that’s racist.
BAD data! NO cookie!
jg
Against what? Some stupid ass thing he made up on the spot? Is that how it works? You declare some ridiculous reprehensible solution to a problem then say I’m actually against it so the fact that I said it out loud shouldn’t be discussed?
The ‘study’ wasn’t about race, it was about poverty. He singled out a race. That was dumb. He should apologize. But as long as he doesn’t this is what we’re talking about. Clever.
Defense Guy
What we should do is ignore it. That’s the best way to solve any problem.
tBone
What’s the timeframe, though? I’ve been trying to ignore the Bush administration for 5 years . . .
Techie
As James Taranto notes, Levitt has specifically linked abortion in black communities before.
Of course, Bennet should be crucified for repeating an arguement that the author of the book had laid out to repute it. BECAUSE OF THE HYPOCRASY
Apprently, Bobby Rush has introduced a resolution condemning Bennett. I wonder if it will be brought up that Rush is a former Black Panther….
Nahh……
Defense Guy
Coming soon to a discussion near you:
PC Community: The government doesn’t care about black people, did you see how they were treated in New Orleans during Katrina?
Public Official: I’m not sure I see it that way, but would be interested to know how you think we can help the black community better in the future.
PC Community: What?!? Are you suggesting that black people are in some way inferior, and can’t help themselves?
Public Official: I’m sorry, what?
PC Community: RACIST!!
dagon
techie says:
so what if bobby rush is a former black panther? what, are you gonna next trot out the african-american coloring book as an example of the black panthers’ inherent racism?
man, this is getting ignorant. bennett made a VERY stupid comment and though it’s possible that he left himself enough wiggle room so as not to be pilloried to the extent that he has, people certainly shouldn’t be DEFENDING!! what he said.
and defense guy, if you’ve got such a problem with debating white liberals over race, why don’t you take a shot at a black one?
peace
Defense Guy
Debate? That was hours ago. This is the snarky part of my program. Should I read anything into your statement besides complete ignorance?
I’ll be sure to pass along your statement at my next weekly poker game. Should be good for a laugh or two.
Andrei
According to 2000 census data, some 12% or so.
Given the numbers in the chart, looks about 40%. Hispanics look to make 15% while whites makes up 45%.
Around 75% or so.
Answered above… 45%
You apparently don’t understand what being an asshole is. And yes, DeLong and Yglesias are being assholes too for falling for this “semantically based discussion” on such an absurd comment from an asshat like Bennett.
The gist of my point:
We could abort any class, race or member of the population and see a decrease in the crime rate. The fact Bennett used something as stupid an example with a racial specific remark just shows how prejudiced his tiny little brain is.
Removing the 40% of black criminal element (by aborting all black babies) from the prison population doesn’t drop the crime rate any more than removing whites (by aborting all white babies), which is at 45%. The percentage of blacks and white to the total population is irrelevant in this example. The end result is a total number of people added to or removed from the prison system and how that affects the overall crime rate.
Bennett said, once again:
Well duh. You can abort any race of the population and see a decrease in the crime rate. What does being black have to do with anything then?
ppGaz
I have no dog in the “Is Bennett racist” argument, one way or the other.
But one has to wonder … and ask, and get an answer to …. why he chose to add the word “black” to his brain fart? He could have made the same point without doing so.
Why do we suppose that he chose to use that word when he could have made his point without using it?
(Whether his point is worth anything or not, nothwithstanding).
Andrei
Which means what? An exmaple:
You have 3 different kinds of fruit in a barrel equaling 100 pieces of fruit — apples, oranges and bananas. You have 75% of the fruit as apples, 15% as oranges and 10% as bananas. A certain percentage of each type of fruit is bad, which is spoiling the others with their presence equally. Of the apples, you notice 10% of the apples are bad while 50% of the oranges are bad.
How many bad apples and bad oranges do you have? Answer: 7.5 of each. Meaning if you get rid of either the bad apples or bad oranges, you have the same percentage reduction in spoiled fruit that affects the others in total.
Further, even if you find a way to prevent the 10% of the bad apples or 50% of the bad oranges from ever getting into the barrel, you’d only be to stop the same number of fruit from ever making it in.
Exactly how does the proportion matter again?
Oh… and yes, you are an asshat. But that we already knew.
scs
Andrei, if blacks make up 40% of the prisons and are 12% of the population, they are about 4 times as likely to commit a crime as are whites. The questions we have to consider before we then conclude that whites are less likely to commit crimes are, how does poverty, single parents and urbanism contribute to crime? How much more likely is a white person able to avoid prison for the same crime a black person commits, due to good lawyers etc.? If you control for these variables, you can then get a truer picture of statistical differences. Thats why again I say, for Bennett to make such a statement, he would have to take into account those variables to be fair. And since he doens’t have time in a short interview to get into all the variables, why bring it up at all? That’s why I thought it was stupid.
ppGaz
Oh God, you aren’t trying to teach basic math to DG, are you?
I’ll be in the car ……..
jobiuspublius
Irrelevant. No?
Irrelevant. When people claim that Bennet is racist, it’s not based on advocacy for genocide, which he did not advocate. It’s based on his selective linking of crime and race.
From the Freakonomic link in the top post:
The Freakonomics argument that Bennet doesn’t believe:
Not to mention that aborting all black babies is a crime. Speaking of crime, what are Tom and cronies upto today?
dagon
so bottom line, you’ve got nothing? fair enough
peace
The Irascible Richard Bennett
The Bureau of Justice Statistics says:
Obviously, they’re a bunch of racists.
Russ
Never in my life have I seen such a concentrated heap of reading non-comprehension as in this comment thread.
Let’s suppose I propose Hypothesis-A as a deliberate “straw man” in order to make my rhetorical Point-B in opposition to Hypothesis-A. Is it reasonable to think I actually support Hypothesis-A?
If you think so, you either cannot read, or you’re an idiot of the first order.
scs
Andreii – to correct your math here
Yes you are right, if you got rid of the oranges, or apples, you would get rid of 7.5 bad pieces of fruit. And though the total number of bad fruit eliminated would be the same, the percentage of bad fruit to good fruit would be different. If you got rid of the apples you would have a 50% bad/good fruit, and if you got rid of the oranges it would be a 10% bad/good fruit ratio. So it just depends how you want to figure it, but we usually go by percentages to total population, not total bad fruit.
John S.
The imbecile Richard Bennett never ceases to amaze…
What on Earth makes you think that the prevalence of imprisonment is the same as the prevalence of crime committed?
Rocky Smith
Bennett was really trying to speak in opposition to abortion, not lowering crime through aborting black babies. Unfortunately, his brain spouted something very racist in appearance to make his point. It is one of those things that’ll get you in hot water right away (and rightfully so) as much as calling someone a nazi does. It was stupid and he should apologise. Environment makes some black people criminals- not their DNA. A father in the home wouldn’t solve that problem, but it would help.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
The moron John S. never ceases to amaze me.
Yes, brilliant one, not every criminal offender is caught, convicted, and sentenced. But when the ratio at the back-end is 5:1, we can fairly well assume that the ratio at the front end is not 1:1.
Would you also argue that the different imprisonment rates of males vs. females hide a bias against men in the process of sentencing and incarceration?
jg
The same was said about Durbins comments. If you think he called US soldiers Nazis you can’t read. He still had to apologize because at that time the actually words, not the intent, was all that was important. Now that a republican has put his foot in his mouth, its all about intent and we all have reading comprehension issues.
jobiuspublius
So, Russ, in the case of Bennet’s latest foot in mouth blues, please tell us which is hypothesis A and which is hypothesis B.
scs
Even if that were true, the statement is still offensive and unfair to blacks, the majority of whom don’t commit crimes. That’s why we usually try to avoid racist and gender generaliations in this country, Richard. Those statements paints a whole class of people with a broad brush, and is unfair to the people who have nothing to do with the crimes committed by other people who happen to have the same skin color as they do. Its just unproductive and just considered rude, hence why Bennett should have avoided it.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
Bill Clinton said he wanted to have a nationwide dialog on race. I guess that’s off the table now, because it’s “rude” to make truthful and accurate observations that touch on race.
That’s good to know, but I wish I’d had the memo on advance of this discussion.
Slartibartfast
Ok, scratch my previous assessment of another comment as being tragically stupid. So far, the above is the winner.
Slartibartfast
Oops, we may have another winner. DATA are offensive and unfair to blacks?
BAD DATA! NO cookie!
Andrei
You obviously missed the part about:
A certain percentage of each type of fruit is bad, which is spoiling the others with their presence equally. I even put the word equally in bold. I wonder why.
Maybe it has to do with the fact the percentage of specific bad fruit to specific good fruit is meaningless when their negative effect is equal to the entire barrel?
I have no idea how this is supposed to make any difference given the net negative effect remains the same. Removing 7.5 peices of bad fruit is removing 7.5 fruit, regardless if its apples or oranges.
The only way your comment seems to make sense of course if you are suggesting all out fruit genocide by completely elimating oranges all together. But we wouldn’t want to accuse you orange racism now, would we? Besides, where would get your vitamin C?
Slartibartfast
Hint: we’re not talking about total crime, we’re talking about crime rate. Be the ball, Andrei.
scs
Andrei- okay Island A has 50 pieces of fruit, 10 of which are bad. Island B has 1000 pieces of fruit, 10 of which are bad. Both islands have 10 bad pieces of fruit.
So, which desert island would you like to be marooned on for a month, Island A or Island B? I think if you are not idiot, you’d choose Island B, that is if you don’t want to get real hungry real quick. That is why we usually stick to percentages to assess a problem.
Andrei
Ok, scratch my previous assessment of another comment as being tragically stupid. So far, the above is the winner.
Oh really?… Then are you saying that given the black population of prisoners and white population of prisoners being somewhat in the equal range number of bodies in jail, that if we aborted all the white babies we wouldn’t see a similar number decrease in the crime rate, Mr. Number Cruncher?
Aborting black babies would see a reduction of 40% of the prison population by the logic being used here. Aborting all white babies would see a reduction of 45% of the prison population. Aborting hispanic babies would see a reduction in 15% of the prison population…
Ok… you’re right… aborting all asian babies has not effect. Silly me. And I forgot… rich people don’t commit crimes, so aborting all of their babies does nothing either.
scs
Its not the data that’s offensive, its the need to judge people in categories. People are individuals, why make them a category?
Andrei
Bigger Hint: The crime rate itself is affected by the total number of people committing them.
250 million times 12% is 30 million people. If you claim 25% people here commit crime, that’s 7.5 million.
250 million times 75% is 187.5 million. If you claim 4% here commit crime, that’s still 7.5 million.
If you remove either populations from the pool, you’ve reduced the total number of criminals equally. The crime rate is the frequency with which crimes are occuring. (I’m making an over simple assumption of 1 criminal == 1 crime.)
jobiuspublius
Dude!!!!!! That is a crime!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh, wait that would be like fighting fire with fire. Or, turning a corner with a corner. OK, I see the light.
Andrei
Given that the original example does not separate them, like you keep wanting to do, this exmaple is flawed. We do not live on separate islands, we live on the same one and all share the same source of fruit. IOW, when you combine them on the same island, removing one set of bad fruit descreases your chance of getting sick to the same degree as removing the other.
I’m done. You people are fucked. Have a good weekend.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
Did you have a hard time with fractions, Andrei?
You don’t seem to understand that this “rate” thing has both a numerator (the top number) and a denominator (the bottom number).
jobiuspublius
Speaking of fuck, fruit tend to multiply. So, if you get rid of all the strange fruit, the other fruit will take their place. Then, you are back to square one, bad fruit again. So you see, it makes no sense to target one fruit for extermination.
Speaking of fruit, where is Hot Tub Tom?
jg
I think we can have a discussion about race. I just think that if your discussing social security and no one has mentioned race but you bring up race even though the study you’re referring to didn’t specify race maybe ‘race’ is on your mind, in a freudian sort of way. If it was simply a mis-speak, then why not apologize to those who were offended? You didn’t intend to offend them so an apology is easy. Right?
Nice. Most people would say ‘Data is’. As your reward you shall win Powerball this weekend.
Andrei
Last time I checked Richard… rate was “a quantity measured with respect to another measured quantity” or “a measure of a part with respect to a whole; a proportion”
So… how are you calculating crime rate? I was assuming criminal population in proportion to the popluation as a whole, and making an assumption of on average, one criminal equals one crime. (A vastly oversimplified defintion, I know.)
IOW, if there are 250 million people, and 15 million are committing crimes, you have a crime rate of 6% that is affecting the population or so. So if you remove 7.5 million from the criminal pool, your crime rate drops to 3%. As I mentioned, if we take the black and white criminal population — which is basicaly equal today — and removed either, we’d have the same end result in the decrease of the crime rate.
So tell me genius, how would aborting black babies affect the crime rate differently as opposed to aborting white babies if the population of both sets of people contributes equally to pool of criminals?
A = (25%*(12%*250)
B = (4%(75%*250)
rate = [(A+B)/250]
How does removing either A or B change the end net result if you had to remove only one of them from the pool? It only does if A or B weren’t equal.
Sinequanon
John(BJ), if you can’t see that he inferred that blacks are responsible for high crime rates and therefore his link to aborting black babies, even if he then said it was a bad thing to do,…..wow, well, I’m surprsied. Bennett is a disgusting volatile hypocrite.
Sinequanon
So, it’s ok for Bennet to be inflamatory, but not Dean? Come on now, lets be fair at least.
Mumon
I agree with your general attitude towards, Bennett, but I will disagree: it’s racist.
Why? Because the issue’s one of poverty: if he had said you could abort all the poor people, he’d have made his point without regard to race.
Poor people commit crimes – the ones that Bennett cares about- roughly at the same rates.
(Of course rich people commit stock fraud and “white collar crimes” and the high profile ones happen to be white…so if we just aborted the fetuses of rich white people…)
scs
Okay Andei, I will try one more time. If you remove the white or black race from the pool, TOTAL NUMBERS of crime will decrease the same, as you said. However, if you remove the white pool, total POPULATION will also decrease A LOT, thereby increasing the crime RATE. If a crime rate is larger, the concentration of criminality is increased, and your chance of being mugged as you walk down a street with the same number of people on it is greater. That’s about as much as I can explain.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
Mumsie, you’ve missed the point by a mile:
Bill could have said poverty instead of race, but he didn’t. His issue wasn’t really with race or with poverty or even with crime, it was with abortion and Freakonomics.
Take any social issue and apply Freako reasoning to it: we can reduce the rate of any X by aborting any group Y such that Y is more likely to do X than the general population.
Bill says OK, yeah, we could, but that’s not the way we do things in America. Your remarks are inflammatory race-baiting.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
In other words, Andrei, when you remove a group from the rate fraction you reduce the size of both the numerator and the denominator; your analysis only removes them from the numerator.
If you have one group that offends at the overall average rate, removing them has no effect on the resulting ratio. If you remove a group that offends at a high rate, you reduce the resulting ratio, and if you remove a group that offends at a low rate, you increase the resulting ratio.
Fractions are tricky things, best left to Republicans.
DougJ
You are a jackass.
The Comish (sic)
Jg:
He did apologize to those offended.
And yet, I can’t shake the suspicion that his apology is going to make one whit of difference. Obviously, the condemnation of Bill Bennett has nothing to do with whether or not he’s sorry or intended to convey the message that people are attributing to him.
DougJ
Comish and other Bushies: why are you discussing this *at all*? Any discussion of a right-wing radio host calling for mandatory abortions for black women hurts your cause. I know he didn’t mean it, I know that once you get past his nauseating pomposity and hypocrisy, that Bill Bennett is a decent guy.
Karl Rove would not want you to be discussing this.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
Who did that? It certainly wasn’t Bill Bennett, because he said something quite the opposite, that abortion is wrong, whatever the reason.
DougJ: moron or liar? You decide.
The Comish (sic)
Mumon, Sinequanon, jobiuspublius, etc.,
Yes, poverty is a better indicator of crime than race. But as it stands, race is a pretty good statistical indicator. Let’s take a look at what the author of Freakanomics said (and which jobiuspublius thinks refutes the link between race and crime):
So there’s our baseline: there is a statistical link between race and crime. However, he disputes that there is a causal link between the two. Let’s take a look:
“Except for homicide.” So even controlling for all sorts of factors which aren’t controlled in the real world, our economist is unable to say that there’s no link between race and crime.
Of course, I think this is ridiculous. Black people are no more inherently likely to become criminals than whites.
But there’s the rub: Bennett didn’t say or imply otherwise. He merely accepted the world as is, and extrapolated from there. Bennett’s statement was statistically accurate. Blacks are more likely to be involved in crimes because they are also more likely to be poor and to come from broken homes and teenaged pregnancy. That doesn’t make Bennett a racist; it makes the world an unfair place. Huge surprise there.
So unless you can point to something in Bennett’s statement that implies that he attributes this statistical anomaly to something other than environmental factors, then you’re accusing the man of being a racist merely because he’s recited inconvenient facts.
But of course, the offense being shown on the left is selective. Because John Kerry can say that there are more blacks in jail than in college, and no one is offended (even if that statement is probably false).
DougJ
Richard, that’s what creeps into the discussion, the idea that Bennett is calling for mandatory abortions for black women. I know that’s not what he did, but that’s how it will be viewed by the public.
You really are a jackass, in any case.
jobiuspublius
It seems to me that what you ascribe to Freako is not Freako’s at all.
Andrei
SCS, now we are getting somewhere… sort of.
So, to keep this simple, we’ll assume a population of 250 million, 12% black which is 30 million and 75% are white. If starting today all white people had their babies aborted (no one said we were killing all the crackers to remove them from the population, just that we’d abort their babies), and we assume all the black people have on average 2 children per couple over the next 15 years, you’d have an additional 30 million black people (if they all got married and had kids) on top of the current 250 million population for a new total population of 280 million. Of the 30 million introduced, if we stick with 25% become criminals, 7.5 million criminals are also added to the criminal population pool.
So in this scenario, you have 280 million people, 7.5 million criminals are removed for being white (we simply execute the current ones to make sure we only have black criminals in this new crime pool), 7.5 million exisiting black criminals from today, and add a new 7.5 million black criminals introduced from this time period.
So we have 15 million criminals in a pop of 280 million for a crime rate of 5.3%, a reduction in the rate of 6% from 15 years earlier.
That extra percentage can be made up by assuming a death rate that equals 30 million in that time span. But even if 60 million die in that 15 year span is only a 6.8% crime rate. You tell me… is that “A LOT”?
The only way your example works is if we kill all the crackers or change the percentages from the starting point.
John S.
You have no idea.
jobiuspublius
I wonder why. Could it have anything to do with history? Could it have anything to do with the fact that so much “thought” centered around race is not scientific? Bennet is a big boy now, he should accept the responsibility of distancing himself from the crackers. It would help him be usefull, if that is his intent.
Bennet is a racist in my book, he’s fixated on this concept that is second hand at best.
The Comish (sic)
DougJ:
That will only creep into the discussion if it’s placed there by dishonest people. And I believe in the Founders’ vision: that lies are better corrected by more speech, rather than less.
I’m talking about it because it interests me. And because Karl Rove told me to.
Now is this the part where you start imagining sexual fantasies about me?
alppuccino
If you shoot all the fat people, incidents of pudding shortages at your local Country Buffet would be greatly reduced.
Who are the real racists?
-a non-black who points out that blacks are committing crimes against blacks at an alarming rate?
-or the non-black who answers, “Forget that shit, you’re a racist!”?
Racism is bad. It’s bad when it really happens. It’s bad when it’s claimed but is not happening.
Don’t go with those people. They’re racists. Stay with us. We understand that those racists are holding you down and we will “help” you while your being held down. We won’t ever point out any of your failures or shortcomings. We won’t hold you accountable for any of your choices. We won’t ask more of you than we think your capable. Stay with us. You can’t move up in their racist world and we will make you as comfortable as possible there at the bottom.
After all, we’re not blind, you’re black and they’re racists.
Jordan
Andrei,
Funny how somebody who’s decrying Bennett as a racist doesn’t hesitate to use the word “cracker” when describing whites. Pot meet kettle.
Disclaimer from Howard Dean: The pot calling the kettle black is double-plus ungood hate speech. The pot should have called it something not offensive such as cracker, wop, wetback, twinkie, etc. After all, only blacks can be victims of racism, and only evil white Republicans can be racist.
Jordan
Hey all you whiny, race-baiting morons, what would you say if he had said the following instead:
“If you abort all male babies the crime rate would drop.”
“If you abort all white male babies, the serial killer population would drop.”
I’m sure you morons would still be lining up to criticise him right? right?! guys?!…
Slide
Why should we assume he is talking about environmental factors? Can you point to something in Bennett’s statement that implies that he attributes this statistical anomaly to enviornmental factors? the ONLY factor he mentioned was RACE (black babies). As I have said before, if he had said “babies born in poverty” he would be on firm ground, but he didn’t did he? No, Mr. Virtue decided to equate lowering crime rates with eliminating black babies. But hey, I hope the right keeps defending his comments. Guess the old saying, “When in a hole, stop digging” is not something you subscribe to.
ppGaz
BWAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
You got a real live one by the tail, Doug.
But I don’t know if your 20 lb. test line can bring in this horse’s ass! He’s a fighter!
jobiuspublius
Mmm, no, you’re not addressing my point of view.
jobiuspublius
Welcome back slide. :)
Andrei
Only if their base population is equual. Otherwise the rate of their impact at which they offend is directly related to their proportion of the overall population. In other words, how many of them there are is significant in determing the ratio, not just that 25% of their population, or 1 in 4, are incarcerated.
Once again, an example would be:
A = (25%*(12%*250))
B = (4%(75%*250))
rate = [(A+B)/250]
You apparently missed that in the equation that A and B were equal. 25% and 4% (a proportion of each population that results in a near equivalent contribution to the criminal pool, which is the current state of the nation today) is meaningless on its own, unless black and whites each made up 50% of the total population and were equal. That is obviously not the case, genius.
With your approach to fractions it’s easy to see why so many GOPers get jailed for accounting fraud.
Andrei
Sorry I forgot what the W3C tag markup was to tag something for the humor impaired who can’t comprehend snark.
DougJ
This is funny I think, but I don’t really understand it. Why would I start imagining sexual fantasies about you?
DougJ
This is slightly off topic, but I also thought that some high-browish Public Enemy, Mos Def type rap outfit should have called themselves the Crack Babies.
DougJ
Okay, what I’m hearing is that Bill Bennett didn’t mean that at all about aborting black babies. *He was just reading aloud from Who’s Who to fill dead air*. There is really some crazy stuff in that book — names of covert CIA operatives, recipes for genocide — I wonder what else is in there.
Slide
Andrei, with all due respect, your posts are giving me a fuckin migrain. This is not about statistics and whether something is empirically correct or not in my estimation. Its about not having a clue as to how utterly offensive his comment would be. (yeah, yeah, I know he disavowed genocide in his next statement, whata guy). What those on the right don’t seem to comprehend is that a statement can be both technically accurate AND still be offensive (i.e. if we kill all the homosexuals we will have less incidence of AIDS). Ok, maybe that is true. So? Should one say it? Are you going to defend it? Apparently for those on the right, the answer is yes.
jobiuspublius
Yes, because “you” aborting all of xyz is criminal in itself. Something you and Bennet fail to grasp.
DougJ
Correct me if I’m wrong but wouldn’t that spell instinction for our species in the long run.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
Andrei, in your example the denominator is a constant: 250. Hence your error. The exterminations affect the denominator, actually.
Let’s make it real simple: say 1 in 2 blacks is criminal compared to 1 in 10 whites; easy numbers, not accurate. And let’s say 1 in 10 people is black, and all the rest are white.
The overall crime rate would be 14 per hundred (five of the ten blacks plus 9 of the 90 whites.)
Kill all the blacks, and the crime rate becomes 10 per hundred; kill all the whites, and it becomes 50 per hundred.
Is is still hard to understand?
The Freako boys said that massive abortion produced a reduction in crime after 30 years. That gave time for old criminals to die off and new ones to take their place, but at a lower rate.
Don’t think too hard, it will make your head hurt.
John Cole
My God. From the Department of Not Getting It.
Yes, it would be appropriate to say it, if you are making an argument such as what Bennett was making. And just like the argument you made here, in which you clearly have stated something despicable, I realize you are not advocating it. Neither was Bennett. IN fact, it is the despicable nature of the argument THAT MAKES BENNETT’s POINT THAT YOU DON’T APPROACH MORAL ISSUES WITH STRICTLY UTILITARIAN ARGUMENTS.
Fucking Christ.
Slide
Bennett basically said that if we killed all the black babies a societal good would result (lower crime rate)
but alas it would not be possible or morally right to do so.
Can’t everyone see how some might be offended by that?
DougJ
Some of those fetuses were underprivileged, so this working out very well for them.
John Cole
DougJ- Quit fucking up every thread. Seriously. One or two comments is cute. Fifty stupid know-nothing idiocies does nothing but queer the thread, and you know it.
Slide
No John YOU don’t “get it”. Bennett is equating crime with race. Not poverty. Not poor education. Not single mothers. Not any other socialogical factors, but race – being born black. Black = crime = bad. Simplistic I know but that is the net outcome of comments like. The fact that you “don’t get it” is quite revealing.
The Comish (sic)
slide:
What you seem to be missing is his next sentence, when he calls the idea of aborting all black babies “ridiculous” and “morally reprehensible.”
So what you just said is a perfect example of what Bennett said: Both of you rephrased a premise supposedly set up by someone else, acknowledged that it may be factually accurate, but then said that it’s morally reprehensible so it should be rejected.
So I guess by your own logic. you’re a homophobe. Unless of course you can prove otherwise.
John Cole
No. He isn’t equating crime with anything. He is discussing a well-known and irrefutable correlation between race and crime rates.
You are wrong.
jobiuspublius
Well, you could harvest some cells before the abortion and work some black magic.
John Cole
Comish, it is like Bennett said “If we do X, Y would happen, but X is terrible and awful and we should never do it.”
And all these folks are screaming “BILL BENNETT SAID WE SHOULD DO X.”
The even dumber folks are stating “Bill Bennett should be in trouble because he even mentioned doing X.”
The mind boggles.
The Irascible Richard Bennett
How many of you partisan hacks know that Bill has a Ph. D. in Philosophy? His profssor was a fellow named John Silber who was all about making people think by putting hard questions to them. One of his favorites (which I heard more than once from his very lips): “Slave owners say it’s OK to whip slaves because they don’t feel pain. If that’s true, why whip them?” If Silber was to say this today, he no doubt would be accused of advocating the whipping of blacks.
Bill was saying exactly what John says he said: you can’t justify good ends with bad means: so what if abortion reduces crime, if abortion itself is a crime?
DougJ
John, I’m sorry to be queering this thread, but come on, this whole discussion is idiotic. It is obvious that
(1) Bill Bennett was merely engaging in a reductio ad absurdium argument against what the “what if Roe v. Wade” hadn’t happened stuff
and
(2) What he said was quite incendiary and even offensive.
What more is there to say? This whole discussion is idiotic.
And when Richard Bennett says things like “fractions are tricky things, best left to Republicans” it takes down another level still.
It’s just one big cluster fuck of people calling each other idiots, racists, and hypocrites. It’s a fucking embarrassment to the blog.
jobiuspublius
Fuck’em up DougJ. Give’em gut splitting hell!
Seriously, if fifty is the magic number then why do you continue to allow that number to be exceeded. I’m talking about the total number of comments, not DougJ, which is often the best thing on here.
The Comish (sic)
slide:
Normal people don’t just assume that people are racist, even if they’re Republicans. It requires something beyond political convenience. It requires evidence.
Not to mention that I usually begin with the assumption that someone is not racist, since most people aren’t. And there’s the not-so-small “presumption of innocence” thing in our culture.
Now, I admit that if we assume every statement is racist, then we’ll probably find a lot more of it. But why would we do that? Unless we’ve got some sort of agenda, I mean.
So the burden isn’t on me to prove that he’s not a racist. It’s on you to prove the affirmative. And right now, all you’ve got is the assumption that no one would mention race unless he’s a racist. (Unless that person is a Democrat.)
But to maintain the illusion that he’s a racist, you’ve also got to ignore the fact that he called the practice of aborting black babies “morally reprehensible.” And you’ve got to ignore his statements clarifying his intent (from my link to ABC News earlier):
And you’ve got to ignore Occham’s Razor. And you’ve got to ignore the fact that what he said was true if he was using statistical evidence. And you’ve got to ignore the context of his statement, which is that he was setting up a premise that he admitted he didn’t agree with. And you’ve got to ignore the fact that his entire point — the whole reason for his statement — was to reject the actions which you ascribe as racist.
His whole point was that blacks may be statistically more likely to commit crimes, but the reasons for that are not related to any inherent characteristics of blacks, so eliminating future generations of blacks may be a practical method to reduce future incidences of crime, but the mere suggestion is morally reprehensible. And the reason it’s morally reprehensible is because a) black people are people, too; b) it punishes far more people who will never be criminals than it punishes people that will be criminals; and c) it doesn’t actually address the causes and concerns of crime, but rather punishes the portion of society that suffers from its effects the most.
His whole point was that the motives and actions being ascribed to him were morally reprehensible and ridiculous. It takes some willful blindness to now ascribe those motives and actions to him.
So remind me what you’ve got? Oh, yeah. He’s a Republican who talked about race.
DougJ
That’s a very good summary. You can be smart when you want to be, I see.
jobiuspublius
Oh, yeah:
Slide
Comish I am not suggesting that Bennett wants to commit genocide for Christ sake. That is not the argument. His linking the crime rate to black babies is the offensive portion of the comment. A black baby, like all babies, are innocent. Non-criminal. But, by Bennett’s reasoning, if we killed all the innocent babies of one particular race we would be doing something good for society in that we would be reducing the crime rate. The fact that he adds that it would be wrong to do so, doesn’t make it any less offensive.
jobiuspublius
Damn, Comish, maybe you should be Bennets PR guy, being that you know what he means and can express it for him much better than he can.
That’s such a DougJ rip-off.
Slide
For the forty seventh time, I’ve NEVER said Bennett was racist. One racist comment does not make a racist. I don’t know what is in the head of the grand Bloviator but I do know that his comment was a racist one if we are to go by this description:
jobiuspublius
Why can’t you Bennet appologist just come to grips with the fact that this Bennet verbal turd is just simply not true:
scs
.
Well that’s what rude about it. We are not saying its rude to use the hypothetical reasoning that you mentioned that “If we do X, Y would happen” It’s rude that he’s mentioning the correlation of race and crime without bothering to also qualify the statement with allowances for poverty, etc. Its just not polite to mention a sensitive subject in such a silly way to illustrate an argument, that’s all. Show’s bad judgement for a public figure.
The Comish (sic)
Slide:
Here’s where the disconnect seems to be happening. Because first of all, Bennett rejects the idea that it’s “good” out of hand. He calls it ridiculous and “morally reprehensible.” And he says we shouldn’t do it. That’s a long way from “good.”
Second, it’s a strawman, not Bennett’s philosophy. Want an example of someone else doing the same thing? Once again:
Slide:
Response: “Are you suggesting that if we killed all the innocent homosexuals that we would be doing something good for society in reducing the AIDS rate? Homophobe! Your linking AIDS rates to sexual preferences is offensive.”
It’s the same thing.
John S.
I think that if you wanted to reduce the number of arrogant conservatives, you could abort every white baby in this country, and your conservative rate would go down.
That would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your rate of conservative demagogues would go down.
The Comish (sic)
John Cole:
I wish it did. But it’s pretty much expected, isn’t it?
I need a drink.
TallDave
You know, it’s funny. Asians and Arabs in America face discrimination, too, but actually have lower crime rates and higher incomes than whites.
All this has nothing to do with skin color. It has everything to do with culture and character.
Skin color is meaningless to who we are.
DougJ
Don’t got there, Tall Dave.
Slide
That was exactly my point.
.
John S.
Ok, so if it has nothing to do with skin color, how would you describe a minority ‘culture’ that is discriminated against (just like Arabs and Asians), but has higher crime rates and lower incomes than whites?
jobiuspublius
And a different history, different circumstances, no doubt a different discrimination policy. There is just no comparison.
Not exactly, but, who’s culture and character? That of the victim or the oppressor?
Sadly, some people still haven’t learned that.
Slide
John Cole:
Irrefutable? Its not quite so black and white John (pun intended). Chew on this for a while before you thinking you know everything:
.
jobiuspublius
Look, if you genocided all African-Americans, someone would take their place. So, the crime rate would not change. Why? Because crime is related to poverty, not race. Poverty is not genetic. Therefore, crime is not genetic. Crime is a social problem. Knock out the bottom rung of the ladder and you have a new bottom rung. Therefore, Bennet is wrong.
jobiuspublius
Forget it, slide. I tried that earlier today. They wouldn’t bite. They’d rather play with meaningless numbers and empty labels.
Slide
Last word before I go to bed. Bill Bennett will realize the error of his ways and will apologize. It will be one of those half assed apologies of course, you know, “I am sorry if I have offended anyone. . . yada yada yada”
The administration has already distanced themselves from Bennett’s comments and as time goes on fewer and fewer people will be excusing his reprehensible comments. Like on the federal gov’ts response to Katrina, John Cole will find himself in an ever diminshing cadre of apologists spitting into the wind of public opinion.
jobiuspublius
But, Bennett’s brother is Miller’s lawyer. ;)
ppGaz
Quite. Almost as idiotic as what Bennett said. Almost as idiotic as the blizzard churn (read: Boon) boiling up in blogs right and left today.
Heaven forbid that you’d “fuck up” this thread. Before you got here, it was nothing but sober and serious and rational discussion … just what John wanted.
Oh, brother.
ppGaz
He’ll apologize for the same reason that they all apologize, the Durbins and the Lotts and all of them: They have to. In this day and age, no deed, good or bad, shall go unpunished … unless you work at the White House, of course.
I opened the betting on the Bennett apology earlier and I already have $3m worth of action.
Just kidding John.
Or am I?
jobiuspublius
Where Art Thou.
Staring:
jobiuspublius
Come back everybody! I’m winning!
Slartibartfast
Hours later, slide still doesn’t get the meaning of correlation.
jobiuspublius
Hours later, slarti remains shallow.
ppGaz
Since we know that correlation is not causation …. what is the meaning of correlation?
Sinequanon
You do realize there is even debate whether Christ ever did Fuck – I suppose he was supposed to be the lone male virgin sacrifice….(didn’t the Aztecs do that to women – sacrifice the virgins, I mean?)
Ditto Slide.
Well…..I’m be real interested in seeing those stats … really. Bennett pigeonholed one specific race of people by correlating that specific race, directly, as criminals. He used no other race-crime stats. None. Not even crime to culture, income, education, single or married households, etc. stats. He didn’t even refer to them in general.
Last I heard, Roe v. Wade was still valid and the law of the land.
Just because we do not agree with “your” point doesn’t make us dumb – unless it is because we are “dumbing down” your arguments for Bennett. No need to get pissy.
Ditto….
This is how really BAD memes get started.
Mike
“jobiuspublius Says:
Look, if you genocided all African-Americans, someone would take their place. So, the crime rate would not change. Why? Because crime is related to poverty, not race. Poverty is not genetic. Therefore, crime is not genetic. Crime is a social problem. Knock out the bottom rung of the ladder and you have a new bottom rung. Therefore, Bennet is wrong.”
But what about the crime rate among black communities say 40 years ago? I don’t have the Stats, but I’d wager it’s much higher now. Why is that? Here’s what Thomas Sowell says about the subject:
“In every census from 1890 to 1950, black labor force participation rates were higher than those of whites. Only since the 1960s has that reversed. The marriage rates of black males was never as much as 5 percentage points different from those of white males until the 1960s. Now fatherless families have become a ghetto norm. ”
Here’s the best article I’ve found on the article, though many here won’t like it since it idicts some liberal activists for being the idiots they are:
http://www.city-journal.org/html/15_3_black_family.html
There have been other minority groups discriminated against in this country, the Irish, the Chinese, they’ve had their crime problems, but seemingly managed to overcome that as well as poverty. Why?
What about the Vietnamese boat people? Didn’t they come to this country only a relatively short time ago, and yet seem to be doing quite well?
My point is NOT that crime is genetic (I agree, it’s not), but there is a REAL problem in the Black Community, and it’s NOT just because of poverty. Maybe BENNETT is wrong, but Bill Cosby is right…
Defense Guy
Mike
Yes, you are right. However in this day and age to even broach the subject is to bring out the race pimps and the perpetually outraged who would rather control the language than to have an honest discussion about what to do about it. They would rather end the conversation on cries of racism than to address the issue that will continue to see a dispreportionate number of blacks see the inside of a prison. If they are willing to have the conversation at all, they will simply chalk this alarming statistic as being due to racism in and of itself. It’s easier that way really and requires no heavy thinking.
So, my earlier claim that the best way to approach this issue is to just ignore it, is exactly what they would like to do.
As to ppGaz remark about teaching ME math. I’ll chalk it up to head up the ass syndrome. Fairly common in him really.
Sinequanon
Based on that and general census population breakdown by race of 12.5% Hispanic, 12.9% Black, and 74.6% White of every 100 people:
-0.96/100 Hispanic Males are in prison
-2.14/100 Black Males are in prison
-1.94/100 White Males are in prison
Census
Well, those are really incredible statistical anomolies – certifiably proving that there is more black crime and more black males in prison than any other race (sarcasm). Obviously not much different than white males as a percentage of that population. The only anomoly here is that, statistically, fewer Hispanic Males are in jail than either black or white males and that white and black males are double that of Hispanics in jail as a single group comparison.
ppGaz
You don’t have to “chalk it up” at all. It’s just good old fashioned making-fun-of-you, Defense Gay.
jobiuspublius
Mike, you tell me about a 40 year old crime rate. You pose the question then give me data that doesn’t answer the question.
You can’t compare the black experience to any other in this country. That should be obviouse. BTW, the Irish are whites too. In fact the “whites” also immigrated here.
BTW, about the past, two words: Emmet Till.
If there is a problem in the black community, who do you want to blame? Is it’s still a national tradition to assert that there is a real problem in the black community? Well, at least there aren’t any more lynchings. Those are real hard to collect data on.
I don’t remember what Cosby said anymore, but, Bennet is today’s pooh stepper.
Are you saying that crime is not just poverty dependant? The Freakonomics guys say that crime is mostly poverty dependant. If that is true and crime is not genetic, then what does race have to do with it? Nothing to little. So, remove an entire race, there will still be poor people to target. That’s why Bennet has no basis in linking crime to race. But he does, thru a contradiction no less.
Bennett claims that he doesn’t know if the Freakonomics view(according to him) that crime is down because abortion is up is true. Then, he says he knows it’s true that you can reduce crime by abortion. Bennett says it’s black abortion, genocide specifically. He contradicted himself and to make matters worse, he justifies the contradiction on racial terms. Tell me that he is not a racist.
BTW, I haven’t seen any calculations to prove anything the numarical Bennet appologists are claiming. Looking forward to it.
Oh, one more thing, take a close look at what Bennett said. How the hell can you guys make sense out of that? It’s worse than baby talk and you guys are old.
P.S. thx for the link. It’s interesting.
lol
jg
I’m not diputing any connection between being black and being a criminal. I’m not saying the subject is taboo and therefore shouldn’t be discussed. I just think its weird that out of nowhere, when responding to a caller saying that if there had never been abortions we’d have a solvent SS system, he went on this tangent where he referenced a ‘study’ that tried to link abortion and low crime rates (apparently they both occurred so you know, one caused the other or something) but which didn’t specify race at all except that he referenced it by stating that if you aborted all the black babies you’d have less crime. Thats not what the book said. He seemed to be saying that the callers notion was as absurd as thinking that abortion is a good crime fighting tool but instead of giving the whole picture of the study he instead points out a detail. A part that didn’t give the image of white kids being killed.
Anyway to me thats why it was innapropriate and deserves an apology. Apparently he gave one already so fine, its done. Lets put all the silly math away and just realize it was an weird thing to say at that moment and let it go.
rilkefan
Dang, Slart, you had to show up at the one thread this month where the liberal commenters are foaming at the mouth and the conservative commenters are being more or less reasonable.
Just for the sake of completeness:
What Bennett said was true, unracist, off-the-cuff, and hurtful and harmful to the country. There are true statements that ought not to be said in public:
“What an ugly baby!”
“Most American voters are uninformed and not very smart and unmotivated by what’s best for their country as a whole.”
“You’re going to die and I think being nice to you ups my chances of collecting when it happens.”
“The government shouldn’t oversee marriage, just civil unions.”
“Most Americans are pro-torture and believe in astrology or fairy tales about Jesus or Santa or whoever because of an ability to think logically.”
“Most people have some degree of racism – how about you?”
“Dear, I’d like us to have a threesome with your friend so-and-so.”
rilkefan
Oh yeah – one final thing to add – if Bennett refers to the black population every time he makes this analogy, and not other groups, that _would_ be evidence of racism, and the individual statements would be racist. In this case root n doesn’t mean anything, but I assume that a lot of the outrage comes from people for whom this is N+1 where N is summed over a lifetime. It’s a common human fallacy to misunderstand what an uncorrelated observation is.
Pb
For the record: first, what Bennett said was highly debatable. If you “aborted all black babies”, actual crime would go up. The ‘crime rate’ might go down, however. You get two guesses as to why.
Second, the fact that he singled out ‘black babies’ in association with crime seems pretty ignorant to me. Racist? Quite possibly. That’s the sort of association that shouldn’t flow readily from anyone’s mouth who isn’t racist, IMO.
Finally, the fact that people can look at that statement and say that he has “nothing to apologize for” just boggles my mind. If I let my baser instincts take over, then I’d take this time to tell them all that they’re insensitive tone-deaf soulless ignorant mouth-breathing hacks that should have been rendered extinct by the rise of homo sapiens sapiens, and that I have nothing to apologize for. Heh.
tommy higbee
So was Bennett a racist for saying what he did?
One good question might be, did he have any OTHER good reason for picking the example he did, that of aborting black babies to try to attain a lower crime rate?
Well, let’s look at the context:
Why an example of doing or not doing abortions for the sake of a practical social benefit? Because that was the topic of discussion by the caller. (At this point, it’s irrelevant whether the practical social benefit is real or perceived)
Was he arguing that the practical social benefit justified whether or not to do abortions? No, he was arguing two things: 1) it was very hard to know exactly how doing or not doing abortions would affect the world, say, 20 years from now, and 2) that a practical social benefit, even if sure, did not justify doing abortions, and therefore you shouldn’t try to use it to justify NOT doing abortions.
So to make the point he reaches for an example of doing abortions that would be unambiguously and obviously wrong, no matter the social benefit. Obviously, aborting black babies just to reduce the crime rate is unambiguously and obviously wrong, and the listener properly recoils from the idea.
So when you find the example repugnant and racist, THAT’S EXACTLY BENNETT’S POINT! That’s exactly why he used the illustration as a COUNTER-EXAMPLE.
In other words, he’s saying, “Your kind of reasoning would support this horrible idea of aborting all (individual) black children in order to cut the (statistical) crime rate. So your kind of reasoning is obviously wrong.”
So it’s certainly plausible he picked the example not because he’s racist, but because by its repugnance he illustrates those kind of arguments are morally wrong, whatever the practical benefit.
Call it a “reductio ad repugnem” as opposed to a “reductio ad absurdem.” (pseudo-Latin, anyone?)
Now this fits the context of everything Bennett was saying far better than the presumption he was just letting his inner racist show through.
So if you firmly believe Bennett is evil and racist, no amount of defense of his position matters. Even the fact that he said it would be “impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible” is explained as something a bigot might say to avoid admitting his bigotry.
People who see Bennett as evil and racist don’t care what defense you make of his statements. They don’t have to try to understand what he was saying: they already know the REAL reason he said it is because he is racist.
But no matter how hard you twist, Bennett could say EXACTLY what he said without having a racist bone in his body. So the charge that what he said was racist is unsupportable. All you really have is the suggestion — or smear — that the REAL reason he said it is because he is racist.
And that’s only convincing if you already believe it to be true.
I know some have tried to argue that picking that specific example proved his racism. That he could have used the example of aborting babies who are poor, or come from single-parent homes, or from the South, or every nth male baby, or any other factor that correlates with a high crime rate. One of these examples would have made the point without bringing race into it.
Now it’s true that whether you abort a baby because it’s poor, or from a single-parent home, or from the South, or male, or female, or black, it’s still an abortion, and therfore equivalent to any other type of abortion.
But if you’re Bill Bennett and you’re trying to make a policy counter-example that you expect most people to find morally repugnant, you know most people will find a race-based policy particularly loathsome. None of the other examples work nearly as well, even a gender-based policy.
Slide
Mike said:
One difference with the groups you cited and blacks, they came of their own volition. They wanted to come to America for the opportunities they saw in this country. They came with loads of ambition, their families intact, and with their traditions and culture to guide them through tough times.
Now contrast that with how blacks came here. They were kidnapped from their land, seperated from their families, traditions, culture and put into the hold of a ship in chains. They were then sold as property as animals and many were made to live without any family bonds for generations. I know its convenient for many to say, hey thats past history, well its a past history that has a legacy and ramifications till this very day.
Mike’s post is a perfect example of why Bennett’s comments are so insidious. They give comfort and solice to the kind of gargage he spewed.
Slide
Slartibartfast Says:
Oh brilliant slartibartfast, you keep bringing up corrleation as a justification to what bennett said. Again if you read my posts I am NOT making the argument that the statement be emperically false but it puts the emphasis on RACE rather than many other CORRELATIONS with crime (i.e. poverty, single mothers, education, being male etc) His selective use of ONE CORRELATION over the others was a racist choice.
And since you are so hung up on CORRELATIONS, read this and educate youself a bit ok?
So race is not the determining factor regarding crime, but one would not get that from Bennett’s statement would one ?
jobiuspublius
If Bennett wanted a reductio ad absurdum, a gender-based statement would have worked flawlessly. Think about it.
BTW, Isn’t Bennett’s brother Miller’s lawyer?
Mike
“Slide Says:
Mike said:
One difference with the groups you cited and blacks, they came of their own volition. They wanted to come to America for the opportunities they saw in this country. They came with loads of ambition, their families intact, and with their traditions and culture to guide them through tough times.
Now contrast that with how blacks came here. They were kidnapped from their land, seperated from their families, traditions, culture and put into the hold of a ship in chains. They were then sold as property as animals and many were made to live without any family bonds for generations. I know its convenient for many to say, hey thats past history, well its a past history that has a legacy and ramifications till this very day.”
What you say is absoutely true and I’m sure certainly figures into the equation. But is also happened a VERY long time ago. We’ve spent $6.6 TRILLION Dollars in support of the “Great Society”. So how much more will it take? Couple of more trillion? How much more “Affirmative Action? Etc., etc.
I say no. I say it’s time for a little personal responsibility in the Black Community, which is really all guys like Cosby and others are saying. Anyway, that’s another topic for another day.
“Mike’s post is a perfect example of why Bennett’s comments are so insidious. They give comfort and solice to the kind of gargage he spewed”
I think you just called me a racist, or at a minimum supportive of Bennett’s comments. Of which I’m neither, but I will say that I think this Bennett thing is just one more tempest in a teapot elevated by those with nothing more noble than “an agenda”. Have fun with it, for myself, I’m already bored.
donald
Um, Jeff Gannon, that would be a bigot, as opposed to rascist. But I don’t suppose you are any of your buddies would want to consider the actual definitions here. But hey, we live in a democracy dont’ we? Some people see this as a nusiance thought. But I would posit, that the complete stupidity of most of the american people has allowed debate and politics to become like mud wrestling.
donald
Um, folks, that would be a bigot, as opposed to rascist. But I don’t suppose anybody would want to consider the actual definitions here. But hey, we live in a democracy dont’ we? Some people see this as a nusiance thought. But I would posit, that the complete stupidity of most of the american people has allowed debate and politics to become like mud wrestling. Bill Bennett is a hypocrite and is an embarrassment. I hate people who preach morality, then exhibit similar behavior. I of course have no problem with gambling, whoring, and drug use, and can say what I want
Rider
Forget the means (abortion), he sincerely believes the basic proposition: that if the black birth rate somehow dropped to zero, the crime rate (crimes / population) would go down.
If you believe that, you believe that black babies are criminals-in-the-cradle. This is a racist belief.
If he believes that proposition, and we’ll have to take him at his word (“I do know that it’s true…”), he’s a racist. He is also ignorant and a fool.
It doesn’t matter whether the black birth rate dropped to zero through mass abortions (which he rejected) or because all the black women in America entered convents and became nuns. It’s his basic proposition (which he endorsed) that is racist: that black babies grow up to be criminals (in numbers large enough to make a disproportionate impact on the crime rate, presumably).
jobiuspublius
Slide, I was concerned that if your spelling it out would have us miss out on the fun of watching these people not simple step in it, but, drown in it. But, looking at Mike’s response, I’m confidant that the fun and games will continue.
Com Con
What Bill Bennett did is called a *thought experiment*. He wasn’t advocating anything. And the stats back him on this.
I have a feeling a lot of you just don’t like Dr. Bennett, because of his earlier writings. The popularity of his books demonstrated that Americans are sick of the wishy-washy relativism of liberal values and long for a return to old-fashioned, right and wrong, black and white discussions of morality.
You should try listening to Dr. Bennett’s show before you condemn him. You’ll find that most of what he says is nothing but decent, moral advice for people who her at sea emotionally. I hope you wouldn’t have a problem with that.
slide
Mike said:
Have I said anything about spending money on social programs or affirmative action? I just pointed out why there is a difference in groups that came to America of their own intention and those that did not. I did not offer any “solutions” so please don’t ascribe to me various positions that you assume I have.
Mike:
No Mike I didn’t. Trust me, if I was going to call you a racist you would know it. I am not shy in stating my opinions as you might have noticed. I’m very careful of using that word as I have no idea what is in your, or Bennett’s, head. Once again don’t acuse me of things I have not done. What I did suggest is that racists would find Bennett’s comments as confirmation of their vile beliefs.
slide
Com Con:
Before or after I blow millions of dollars of my family’s money at a Poker slot machine at 3am in Vegas?
Com Con
Slide, I thought you were the ones that didn’t want to put people in jail for drug abuse. “They’ve got a problem” is what I thought the liberals liked to say. Same for lots of other criminials, “they just have problems”. But with Dr. Bennett, who really does just have a problem, you vilify him for it. All that matters is which side they’re on. If Bill Moyers had a gambling problem, I bet you’d be defending him for it.
Slide
Its not the gambling “problem” that I vilify him for, its the hypocrisy. Same with Rush Limbaugh, who had said some very harsh things about drug users all the while he was sending his maid out to score for him. and of course we have the Grand Bloviator telling everyone how to live a moral and virtuous life while we learn he is spending hours and upon hours alone in a casino losing his family’s money with a gambling addiction. Hypocrisy.
The right are always telling us its about morals and values. Pointing fingers at others for their perceived weaknesses or immoral acts. Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Defense Guy
Slide
Hypocricy is a sin of the one committing it, alone. It does not make the words that he/she is speaking any less wise. It does not make the message sent null and void, it just makes the speaker a unable or unwilling to live up to his own message.
Now, tell me where Bennett talked about gambling in his messages about morality.
Com Con
Exactly.
And where does it say in the bible that gambling is a sin? Nowhere.
John Cole
I actually disagree with DG and Com Con on this one.
Bennett IS a hypocrite. He smokes, he drinks, he gambles- he has a number of vices, but he runs around telling everyone else that THEIR vices are bad, whe nthe only distinction between their vices and his is that his have the weight of the law behind them for no other reason than tradition.
Rider
Here’s an interesting story about Mr. Bennett posted at TPM Cafe today by Reed Hundt, Clinton’s fmr. FCC Chairman:
“When I was chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (1993-97), I asked Bill Bennett to visit my office so that I could ask him for help in seeking legislation that would pay for internet access in all classrooms and libraries in the country. Eventually Senators Olympia Snowe and Jay Rockefeller, with the White House leadership of President Clinton and Vice President Gore, put that provision in the Telecommunications Law of 1996, and today nearly 90% of all classrooms and libraries do have such access. The schools covered were public and private. So far the federal funding (actually collected from everyone as part of the phone bill) has been matched more or less equally with school district funding to total about $20 billion over the last seven years. More than 90% of all teachers praise the impact of such technology on their work. At any rate, since Mr. Bennett had been Secretary of Education I asked him to support the bill in the crucial stage when we needed Republican allies. He told me he would not help, because he did not want public schools to obtain new funding, new capability, new tools for success. He wanted them, he said, to fail so that they could be replaced with vouchers,charter schools, religious schools, and other forms of private education…
more at: http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/1/105329/697
In 2003 he was before the Texas Legislature trying to get them to pass a bill to authorize spending $23 million to buy computers for fundamentalist parents to educate their kids at home with his online (anti-science) curriculum, which he called “virtual charter schools.” Oh the irony!
Wm. J. Bennett doesn’t have any moral advice I’d be interested in hearing.
Com Con
I can see how that is annoying, but if he is scolding others for something he himself does not do, then that doesn’t make him a hypocrite.
Bennett is Catholic. The Catholic Church has no problem with drinking, smoking, or gambling, but it is strict about a lot of other things. Does that make the Church a bunch of hypocrites?
I do see why you and a lot of other people don’t like him, but it seems like hypocrite is going a little too far.
jobiuspublius
And the popularity of Desperate House Wives? Not all Americans want to regress in the manner you describe.
So, he’s a quack.
Slide
Does this make Bennett a hypocrit?:
or how about this?:
.
Slide
No the pedophilia scandal does that.
jobiuspublius
I’m still waiting for some statistician to prove his defense of Benetts arguement, whatever that was.
Richard Bennett
Here you go:
Source: Bureau of Justice Statistics
Com Con
So now you’re accusing Dr. Bennett of being a pedophile in effect? And all this because of one on-air thought experiment.
Com Con
Thank you, Richard Bennet. And now we have the statistics that prove that blacks are in general more prone to committing crimes. So Dr. Bennet was right. Big surprise.
Slide
Com Con you’re a joke right? A DougJ sorta joke?
Com Con
I shouldn’t say “more prone to committing crimes”. I admit that lots of people who commit crimes don’t go to jail. And I think that unfortunately, a black person who commits a crime is more likely to go to jail for it than a white person.
Still, that does indicate pretty strongly that blacks commit more crimes per capita than whites. I’m sure the factors are social. I’m not saying their race makes them criminals. But I don’t think Dr. Bennett was, either.
Slide
As Yobi Berra once said, “its deja vu all over again.” I think we have beat this thread into bloody submission. I’m outa here.
jobiuspublius
C’mon, Bennett, do a bang up job. Lay it all out, not just some crumbs. Calculate crime/crime-rate from population data, both general and prison, then remove the black population and recalculate crime/crime-rate. It’s your argument go ahead and make it.
Richard Bennett
No.
The point that Bill was trying to make is that it’s not wise to use abortion to advance a eugenics agenda, not to beat up on black people for the flaws in their culture. He used a well-understood data point – blacks commit more crimes than whites – to illustrate the larger point.
Those who insist on calling him a racist or arguing that blacks don’t commit more crimes than whites are simply displaying a sort of holier-than-thou ignorance and demagoguery that does nothing to advance the public policy dialog.
jobiuspublius
Yes, prove this slur. White criminals out number black criminals. Show me how blacks commit more crime than whites. Apparently it’s the basis of his arguement, or yours, and deserves proving. Or else, you fail to convince.
Richard Bennett
I already did that.
jobiuspublius
Oh, please show me where.
Richard Bennett
https://balloon-juice.com/?p=5740#comment-81281
jobiuspublius
That’s not what I asked for. But, don’t trouble yourself, thx. I’ve got plenty of company. Enjoy yours.
Defense Guy
John
I never said he wasn’t a hypocrite.
jobiuspublius
Oo ooo, plz, will Bennett Appologetic Contortionists please do this one, plzzzzzzzzzzzzzz?
jobiuspublius
Interesting.
maurice schaller
You are realy not trying to get the point of a racist statement like that. Black or white, crime is crime, it is not dependent on race. So dont say it is. He needs to think about it and say he was wrong. To every black person in the world, and then crime will go down. Say he is sorry for slavery, civil rights (lack of), and racism, and then he can be forgiven, but before that, he cant. I do not know what is in his heart. I know he was just using his racism thought as a part of an answer, and i am not taking it out of context. He is racist.
Sinequanon
If you will note my previous comment Richard Bennett, I statistically revised those numbers from the Justice Dept to indicate the actuality of men in prison by race and actual overall population. The Justice Department figures are by percentages by prison population, not overall population which is a fair comparitive figure. You can not use the Justice Department figures to be true in what you are trying to prove/support.
Here they are once again:
CENSUS
Richard Bennett
Sinequanon tells an enormous whopper:
Wrong.
Look at these figures again:
If the percentages were of overall prison population, they’d add up to 100%, wouldn’t they? But they don’t, because they’re measures of the prevalence of incarceration in each group.
Sinequanon, you aren’t just a moron, you’re a stubborn moron, and that’s much worse.
jobiuspublius
Oh oh, time for my self flagellating voodoo dolls to get to work.
jobiuspublius
One more time, race does NOT CAUSE crime. Again, race does NOT CAUSE crime. OK, I see we need some more practice. Time for my voodoo dolls.
Remove a race from the population and the CAUSE of crime will remain, because race does NOT CAUSE crime. Therefore, no crime reduction is attained via Bennettonian genocide of Black Americans. Bennett is wrong and willfully so. He’s a racist, maybe not the usual type, but, a racist none the less.
One has to be a racist to hold such absurd views as Bennett holds. That is no surprise when you take a close look at the idea of race, a non-scientific concept. Attributing crime reduction to a reduction in race is a race based blame the victim mentality.
Let’s continue. Race does NOT CAUSE crime.
…
ELINOR DICKEY
No one here is saying that race does cause crime. Association and causation are not the same thing.
E. Nough
I really hate to enter into this lousy excuse for a debate, but hey, someone needs to insert some definitions and a bit more actual data into it.
First, there seems to be quite a bit of outrage over the fact that Bennett chose the hypothetical aborting of black babies for his illustration, with the main thesis seeming to be that we don’t know if blacks commit more crime than whites. I’ll get to that shortly. What’s more interesting to me is that no one seems to object to the claim — offered several times — that poor people commit more crimes. I am left to wonder: had Bennett used a hypothetical counterexample of aborting the babies of poor people, would the outraged pontificators in this discussion find that acceptable?
Second, and there is no way around this: the black population, as a group, commits far more crime on a per-capita basis than whites. To call this factual observation “racism” is to remove all meaning from the term. The cause of this — be it poverty or something else — is irrelevant: what’s relevant for the purposes of this discussion is whether the observation itself is true.
Proof is readily available, as the incarceration data posted above demonstrates. I’ll add a bit more: check out the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports. Their murder rate statistics are most interesting; pick any year and have a look. Just as an example, in 2003:
Let this sink in: blacks commited more murders than any other racial group in the U.S.: over 1/3 of the total, even though they are only 12.9% of the overall population. This has been going on for quite some time, and unless there are some radical changes in the black community that I don’t know about, it’s likely to continue. So, in fact, eliminating future generations of blacks through eugenics — which I am not advocating and neither was Bennett — would, in fact, lower the murder rate, not just in absolute numbers, but in murders per capita of U.S. population.
Given this, in addition to the incarceration statistics above, Bennett’s hypothetical counterexample was entirely correct. If acknowledging this is “racism,” then reality itself is “racist,” and I for one am not interested in pretending that 35.7% = 12.9% just to mollify the jobiuspublii et al of this world.
In short, Bennett made a twofold claim:
As a group, African-Americans commit more crime per capita than others, and a eugenics program tarteging them would reduce the U.S. crime rate, which is true.
The above does not justify creating such a program, which is what aborting black babies would amount to. This was Bennett’s entire point. He takes it as a given that this is a horrible idea, regardless of the justifications offered for it, factually true or not.
Those lining up against Bennett here are committing one of two fallacies: either they think that the first premise is false, in which case they need to open their minds and study the data, or they invert the second premise, in which case they need to learn to freaking read.
E. Nough
Wow, a discussion with jobius is like trying to reason with a busy signal. Let’s just see all the BS compressed into those two sentences:
No one argued that race causes crime. But race, in the U.S., is clearly, demonstrably correlated with crime. Whatever this mysterious cause is, blacks in the U.S. are clearly affected by it more than other racial groups.
The abortion of every black fetus is eugenics, not “genocide,” unless you happen to believe that abortion and murder are the same thing. (Fine if you do, really, but given your left-leaning politics, unlikely.)
Such a eugenics program would not be “Bennettonian,” as Bennett specifically argues against it, which is his whole freaking point! You’re just being deliberately obtuse in order to score cheap political points. A fun exercise, but one that does not reflect well on you.
jobiuspublius
Right, no one knows the cause of crime or who else it will effect in the abscence of black Americans, but, Bennett KNOWS that aborting all black babies will reduce crime/crime-rate. I find such selective knowlege to be highly suspect.
So, to affect change we need not worry with cause and affect or mechanism, association is good enough, even if the concept of race is wishy washy.
Time to excercise my voodoo dolls.
Sinequanon
Well….Moron am I? Interesting and a first for me. Since I do statistical analysis as a part of my living, via demographics of populations, I, ofcourse must be in error. You know don’t you, that the justice department only gave the stats for 3 population groups, not all groups. They only provided the 3 top figures. This is why it doesn’t add to 100%. And, I did not tell a big WHOPPER. And, I am tenacious, rather than stubborn. There is a difference.
Interestingly enough, E. Nough’s data parallels my own if you take the time to do the math and look for the remaining crime data as a whole, which I won’t actually do for you, because, you know…..I’m a MORON. However these are incidents of murder, not overall crime rates per population groups as a whole. (Wondering how exactly I offended
this assholeBennett the 2nd by calmly stating facts.)See this information is for a ‘Total Population’ of that group. However, E. Nough really isn’t looking at the corallaries correctly either, he just wants to prove Black populations have a higher incidence of murder rate. Yet these numbers are just murderers, not crime as an overall figure based on total crime and population for those groups. Consistency in statistics is important. It appears to me that White groups are damned close to that stat in population of murderers, yet Nough never mentioned that. Which, is exactly what Bill Bennett did. Scientifically, these statements would never have been made or even considered.
Oh, yeah, check out Billmon on this debate: Bill Bennett’s Modest Proposal
Enough said.
I have to get back to my report for work now- lots of stats to run you know.
E. Nough
Sinequanon, what do you mean by this:
Whites are 81.7% of the U.S. population, but only 32.0% of the murderer population. Exactly what stat are they “damned close” to? (I’m ignoring the “unknown” category, which makes up 30.4% of the murderer population. But even if all of those unknowns are actually white — a highly unlikely scenario — whites would still be only 32.0%+30.4% = 62.4% of the murderer population, and therefore underrepresented. Blacks would still be at nearly 36% of the murderer population, even though they only make up 13% of the population as a whole — so they are strongly over-represented.) I don’t need to “prove” that blacks have a higher incidence of murder — the FBI has done this for me.
I do agree that the numbers I cite are for murders only, not for crime overall; I never claimed otherwise. Had the FBI statistics on all crime broken out by race, I’d use them — but they don’t. Combined with higher incarceration rates, though, I think it makes for pretty compelling evidence that blacks commit far more crimes than whites, when proportions of population are taken into account.
E. Nough
jobiuspublius:
I do. The cause of the crime is the criminal who perpetrates it. And I know that blacks commit murder more frequently than whites — both in terms of their population, which is bad enough, and in absolute terms, which is simply astounding. What I don’t know, and don’t claim to know, and Bennett doesn’t claim to know, is why. But that doesn’t change the facts.
What do you mean “who else it will effect”? Are you claiming that were blacks not around to commit these crimes, other ethnic groups would increase their respective crime rates to fill in the gaps? That’s an interesting theory…
Since blacks commit crimes with a far greater frequency than any other ethnic group in the U.S., it stands to reason that the U.S. crime rate would be far lower if its black population was zero. (By contrast, if the percentage of crimes committed by blacks was the same as their proportion of the population, the U.S. crime rate would be unaffected by black population levels. If the percentage of crimes was lower than the proportion of the black population, decreasing the black population would actually increase the crime rate. It’s pretty elementary math.)
Side note to stupid people: this is not a justification for actually reducing the black population levels. It’s a hypothetical. Thank you.
I’m sorry you find mathematics so elusive.
Wow, a straw man and a red herring! Well, at least they’ll keep each other occupied.
Richard Bennett
Amazing. According to sinequanon, whites, blacks, and hispanics only account for 27% of the US population. Eskimos are much more numerous, apparently, than anyone ever thought.
Slartibartfast
Thank you. Your other arguments, such as they are, are completely beside the point.
Oh, ow. He said exactly what I’ve been saying:
Cut on the bias, BTW, is up again? Maybe I can start posting on me old blog, then, because I also was on blogfodder.com. Christ, slide, if you’re going to shoot down my arguments, you might want to choose something other than a boomerang.
Slartibartfast
Oh, and sinequanon: you’ve made a mistake. I suggest you pay a bit more attention to Richard Bennett, even if he annoys you. Or, if Bennett annoys you far too much, heed E. Nough. They’re both right.
Oh, and if we’re doing appeals to authority, I do Kalman Filters for a living, so I do have some scant knowledge of correlation.
Sinequanon
Bennett the 2nd:
It is obvious and doubly apparent you know absolutely nothing about statistical analysis. NOTHING.
clownstotheleftjokerstotheright
HA!
If all the black babies were aborted prior to the civil rights era, then you would not have:
1) Rice to take the fall in front of the public at the hearings in spring 2004, while Bush and Cheney testified behind closed doors.
2) Powell ordered to point to the mystical “WMDs” on a sattelite photo map of Iraq after the largely white American Intelligence Agencies produced such billshit.
Where would the conservaties be without black folks to take the fall for them?
Hoping that all of your perfect, white children marry brown and black to increase the conservative heart attack rate!
tired of your crap
Oh, shut up! Here’s a hint: we are sick and tired of you bigoted White boys and your psychotic meanderings down the road to the “Final Solution”. Get over yourselves. We are aware that your mommies convinced you that your pale asses were the most spectacular things on earth, but it’s time to WAKE UP and smell the reality. We BUILT this country for you, you wimpy palefaced idiots. We ARE this country. YOUR people commit most of the crime, OUR people do most of the time. You want a revolution? You’ve got one, crackers. And here’s another revelation: WE DON’T CARE WHAT YOU THINK OF US. YOU ARE NOT IMPORTANT IN THE GREAT SCHEME OF THINGS. Mental-midgets like Bill Bennett are an endangered species. Get out of our country. You reek of desperation, greed, envy, hatred and fear. And you SHOULD be afraid–instant karma’s gonna getcha.