Icon Bill Bennett and abortion....
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By now I'm pretty sure most have heard about this controversy. Last night I saw an interview with Bennett and he was unapologetic and said his comments were "mischaracterized" and he would put his record up against anyone else. He also said that some of his words were taken out of context. Okay, here is the text of this particular back and forth...

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.

Now, my question is, how were his words mischaracterized? They are there in black and white. Yes, he is not calling for the abortion of all black babies and even says that it is a reprehensible thing to do, but to me, where he gets himself into trouble is where he suggests that black babies grow up to be criminals.

And the book Freakonomics discusses how specific abortions have affected crime.

Is this guy just too arrogant to understand his miss-step?
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