Former Education Secretary, best-selling author, and big-time gambler William Bennett is in trouble for this statement:"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 impossibly ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down.
In fairness, his statement seems based on point from Freakonomics, by Stephen D. Leavitt and Stephen J. Dubner. But even if cribbed from someone else, as the purported author of the Book of Virtues and The Devaluing of America, Bennett owes an apology.
What I haven't seen discussed in most news coverage is that Bennett's statement also throws into question the sincerity of Bennett's supposedly anti-abortion, pro-life public stance. Most opponents of abortion believe that it is murder: a crime. If Bennett really believed that, his statement would be illogical, because performing millions of abortions--murder of innocent unborn babies to pro-lifers-- would cause the crime rate to rise, rather than fall. As a Ph.D. in philosophy and a law school graduate, Bennett should know.
It is pretty obvious Bennett didn't think his statement through. He's making it worse by standing by what he said. One question remains: Why have pro-life groups not joined in demanding an apology from Bennett?
