Media Matters exposes Bennett: "[Y]ou could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down"
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Addressing a caller's suggestion that the "lost revenue from the people who have been aborted in the last 30 years" would be enough to preserve Social Security's solvency, radio host and former Reagan administration Secretary of Education Bill Bennett dismissed such "far-reaching, extensive extrapolations" by declaring that if "you wanted to reduce crime ... if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down." Bennett conceded that aborting all African-American babies "would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do," then added again, "but the crime rate would go down."
Bennett's remark was apparently inspired by the claim that legalized abortion has reduced crime rates, which was posited in the book Freakonomics (William Morrow, May 2005) by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. But Levitt and Dubner argued that aborted fetuses would have been more likely to grow up poor and in single-parent or teenage-parent households and therefore more likely to commit crimes; they did not put forth Bennett's race-based argument.
From the September 28 broadcast of Salem Radio Network's Bill Bennett's Morning in America:
CALLER: I noticed the national media, you know, they talk a lot about the loss of revenue, or the inability of the government to fund Social Security, and I was curious, and I've read articles in recent months here, that the abortions that have happened since Roe v. Wade, the lost revenue from the people who have been aborted in the last 30-something years, could fund Social Security as we know it today. And the media just doesn't -- never touches this at all.
BENNETT: Assuming they're all productive citizens?
CALLER: Assuming that they are. Even if only a portion of them were, it would be an enormous amount of revenue.
BENNETT: Maybe, maybe, but we don't know what the costs would be, too. I think as -- abortion disproportionately occur among single women? No.
CALLER: I don't know the exact statistics, but quite a bit are, yeah.
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.
Bill Bennett's Morning in America airs on approximately 115 radio stations with an estimated weekly audience of 1.25 million listeners.
— A.S.
Friday, September 30
Tuesday, September 27
Gotta Love Da Kids
This is my Godson Sterling who affectionately refers to me as "Uncky Shawn." Saturday I dropped by to visit and to give him his overdue birthday present. Sterling never ceases to entertain me. He has officially developed into a ham and half. He's not the class clown type with his antics but his natural behavior is very comical. Look at the expression on his face in the above pic. He swears he's a Dee Jay now. His mom bought him some fake turntable toy that has a mic attached and makes scratching noises. It's a mess! He turns on the synthesized beats, starts scratching and shouting things into the microphone.
Throughout the day he treated me to several moments to add to my personal highlight reel. A few recaps:
* He went on a tirade about how he didn't make the football team at his school. He animatedly shared his frustration in knowing some "fat kid" named Jontha made the squad after he was initially cut and never finished trying out like Sterling and the rest of the other kids. I was surprised by his emotion. I'd never seen him that passionate about anything.
* He instructed me on the proper way to receive your food through the bulletproof glass inside of the local Taco Bell
* As we ate lunch he wanted to watch Harry Potter. Before the movie begins he says you're lucky I don't remember this movie or I would tell you everthing that's going to happen Uncky Shawn
* He tried to convince me that vegetarians can't eat french fries.
It's great spending time with a kid that isn't a future menace to society. He's definitely enriched my life. I hope I am giving enough to him in return. My mission is to increase my efforts to pour great things into him.
Monday, September 26
Victim or Suspect pt 2
Well it turns out that the woman's husband really did commit suicide in their vehicle. How sad! For whatever reason, the police instructed my friend's dealership not to touch the car but to let another nearby dealership come pick up the car.
Thursday, September 22
JetBlue Passengers Watched News of Drama
LOS ANGELES - The airliner circled Southern California for hours, crippled by a faulty landing gear, while inside its cabin 140 passengers watched their own life-and-death drama unfolding on live television.
While satellite TV sets aboard JetBlue Flight 292 were tuned to news broadcasts, some passengers cried. Others tried to telephone relatives and one woman sent a text message to her mother in Florida attempting to comfort her in the event she died.
"It was very weird. It would've been so much calmer without" the televisions, Pia Varma of Los Angeles said after the plane skidded to a safe landing Wednesday evening in a stream of sparks and burning tires. No one was hurt. - Yeah you think? Whose bright idea was that to air "My Near Death Experience by Plane" on the flight's TVs.
Varma, 23, and other passengers said the plane's monitors carried live DirectTV broadcasts on the plane's problems until just a few minutes before landing at Los Angeles International Airport. - We've come this far together, why shut the televisions off now
The landing gear trouble — the front wheels were stuck in a sideways position — was discovered almost immediately after the plane departed Bob Hope Airport in Burbank at 3:17 p.m., en route to New York City.
The Airbus A320 circled the Long Beach Airport, about 30 miles south of Burbank, before being cleared to land at Los Angeles. It stayed in flight for three hours to burn off fuel, said Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Donn Walker.
Zachary Mastoon of New York said it was "surreal" to watch his plane's fate being discussed on live TV while it was in the air. At one point, he said, he tried to call his family, but his cell phone call wouldn't go through. - God why couldn't I be on board this flight watching my near demise broadcaast live so I could in turn sue JetBlue for inflicting undue emotional distress on me?
"I wanted to call my dad to tell him I'm alive so far," the 27-year-old musician said.
The pilot finally brought the plane down, back wheels first. As he slowly lowered the nose gear, the stuck wheels erupted in smoke and flames, which quickly burned out.
"At the end it was the worst because you didn't know if it was going to work, if we would catch fire. It was very scary. Grown men were crying," said Diane Hamilton, 32, a television graphics specialist.
As the plane was about to touch the ground, Hamilton said crew members ordered people to assume a crash position, putting their heads between their knees.
"They would yell, "Brace! Brace! Brace!'" she said. "I thought this would be it."
Lisa Schiff, 34, of Los Angeles sent a text message to her mother in Miami that said: "I love you. Don't worry about me. If something happens, know that I am watching you and Daddy and (her brother) David."
Emergency crews from across the area met the plane on the runway. Spectators gathered on buildings and stood on parked cars to see firsthand as passengers walked down a stairway onto the tarmac with their carryon luggage.
Some passengers shook hands with emergency workers and waved to cameras. One firefighter carrying a boy across the tarmac put his helmet on the child's head. - Not a cheesy photo op. Is this a scene from a movie or what?
"We all cheered. I was bawling. I cried so much," said Christine Lund, 25, who was traveling with her cat. - Mentioning her cat makes me feel far less sympathetic for her. In fact, I feel nothing for her.
She and the other passengers were taken by bus from the tarmac to the airport's international terminal. The plane was towed to a hangar, and the runway where it touched down was closed for about three hours, but no flights were delayed or canceled, officials said.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who spoke with the pilot, identified him as Scott Burke and praised him for the calm he showed during the flight.
"He joked that he was sorry he put the plane down 6 inches off the center line," Villaraigosa said.
Ann Decrozals, an Airbus spokeswoman at the aircraft manufacturer's headquarters in France, said the A320 was designed to be able to land with front wheel problems.
JetBlue spokeswoman Jenny Dervin said the airline was investigating the incident with the FAA and National Transportation Safety Board. She declined to identify the pilot and first officer.
About 57 of the passengers were placed on another flight, which arrived at New York's Kennedy Airport at 6:05 a.m. EDT Thursday, said airline spokeswoman Sharon Jones. Others were put up in Los Angeles area hotels and given reservations for Thursday flights. Still others simply returned home.
Associated Press writer Gillian Flaccus contributed to this story.
While satellite TV sets aboard JetBlue Flight 292 were tuned to news broadcasts, some passengers cried. Others tried to telephone relatives and one woman sent a text message to her mother in Florida attempting to comfort her in the event she died.
"It was very weird. It would've been so much calmer without" the televisions, Pia Varma of Los Angeles said after the plane skidded to a safe landing Wednesday evening in a stream of sparks and burning tires. No one was hurt. - Yeah you think? Whose bright idea was that to air "My Near Death Experience by Plane" on the flight's TVs.
Varma, 23, and other passengers said the plane's monitors carried live DirectTV broadcasts on the plane's problems until just a few minutes before landing at Los Angeles International Airport. - We've come this far together, why shut the televisions off now
The landing gear trouble — the front wheels were stuck in a sideways position — was discovered almost immediately after the plane departed Bob Hope Airport in Burbank at 3:17 p.m., en route to New York City.
The Airbus A320 circled the Long Beach Airport, about 30 miles south of Burbank, before being cleared to land at Los Angeles. It stayed in flight for three hours to burn off fuel, said Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Donn Walker.
Zachary Mastoon of New York said it was "surreal" to watch his plane's fate being discussed on live TV while it was in the air. At one point, he said, he tried to call his family, but his cell phone call wouldn't go through. - God why couldn't I be on board this flight watching my near demise broadcaast live so I could in turn sue JetBlue for inflicting undue emotional distress on me?
"I wanted to call my dad to tell him I'm alive so far," the 27-year-old musician said.
The pilot finally brought the plane down, back wheels first. As he slowly lowered the nose gear, the stuck wheels erupted in smoke and flames, which quickly burned out.
"At the end it was the worst because you didn't know if it was going to work, if we would catch fire. It was very scary. Grown men were crying," said Diane Hamilton, 32, a television graphics specialist.
As the plane was about to touch the ground, Hamilton said crew members ordered people to assume a crash position, putting their heads between their knees.
"They would yell, "Brace! Brace! Brace!'" she said. "I thought this would be it."
Lisa Schiff, 34, of Los Angeles sent a text message to her mother in Miami that said: "I love you. Don't worry about me. If something happens, know that I am watching you and Daddy and (her brother) David."
Emergency crews from across the area met the plane on the runway. Spectators gathered on buildings and stood on parked cars to see firsthand as passengers walked down a stairway onto the tarmac with their carryon luggage.
Some passengers shook hands with emergency workers and waved to cameras. One firefighter carrying a boy across the tarmac put his helmet on the child's head. - Not a cheesy photo op. Is this a scene from a movie or what?
"We all cheered. I was bawling. I cried so much," said Christine Lund, 25, who was traveling with her cat. - Mentioning her cat makes me feel far less sympathetic for her. In fact, I feel nothing for her.
She and the other passengers were taken by bus from the tarmac to the airport's international terminal. The plane was towed to a hangar, and the runway where it touched down was closed for about three hours, but no flights were delayed or canceled, officials said.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who spoke with the pilot, identified him as Scott Burke and praised him for the calm he showed during the flight.
"He joked that he was sorry he put the plane down 6 inches off the center line," Villaraigosa said.
Ann Decrozals, an Airbus spokeswoman at the aircraft manufacturer's headquarters in France, said the A320 was designed to be able to land with front wheel problems.
JetBlue spokeswoman Jenny Dervin said the airline was investigating the incident with the FAA and National Transportation Safety Board. She declined to identify the pilot and first officer.
About 57 of the passengers were placed on another flight, which arrived at New York's Kennedy Airport at 6:05 a.m. EDT Thursday, said airline spokeswoman Sharon Jones. Others were put up in Los Angeles area hotels and given reservations for Thursday flights. Still others simply returned home.
Associated Press writer Gillian Flaccus contributed to this story.
Victim or Suspect?
A friend of mine works in the service dept at a car dealership. How 'bout this! This morning she and her co-workers were writing up service tickets for the cars that were left by customers in the early morning drop off area when they stumbled on a note that says (mind you I am paraphrasing): Can you please detail my car? My husband committed suicide in this car and I wasn't able to clean up all of the blood.
Needless to say, everyone was a bit shocked and alarmed. Immediately, someone speculated that the wife may have offed her husband was trying to cover it up (oh wouldn't that be juicy). My friend called the police who are now at the dealership investigating the scene.
Isn't that nuts? I have been alternating between laughing and feeling bad for the woman. I hope she's a victim and not a suspect.
Needless to say, everyone was a bit shocked and alarmed. Immediately, someone speculated that the wife may have offed her husband was trying to cover it up (oh wouldn't that be juicy). My friend called the police who are now at the dealership investigating the scene.
Isn't that nuts? I have been alternating between laughing and feeling bad for the woman. I hope she's a victim and not a suspect.
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