I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce hypocrisy and ignorance, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every baby belonging to Christian fundamentalist, right-wing, moralizing racists, like William Bennett. Occurrences of multi-million dollar gambling debts would also go down. This would be a possible, not-so-ridiculous, and morally responsible thing to do.
Some experts would say that calling for the destruction of all black fetuses is not the most politically sound policy. It sure didn’t help my bid for the WSA. According to conservative pundit and former Education Secretary, Bill Bennett, though, we could effectively reduce the crime rate by aborting all black babies. He, of course, added afterwards that such a proposition is “ridiculous,” but that’s kind of like telling someone, “you are worthless and fat…no offense.” Bennett’s comments were received about as well as Toby Keith at the Apollo Theater. An uproar has been sounded by the usual suspects – Al Sharpton, Rep. Bobby Rush, Rep. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., and others.
But then, I suppose all black people are “the usual suspects.” While Bennett’s comments were idiotic, the outrage has focused too closely on a misguided sound bite and not enough on the racist system for which Bennett and his ilk stand. Bennett’s comments may have hurt some feelings, but they start to sound like the lyrics to “We Shall Overcome” when compared to our policies in criminal justice, law enforcement, and the prison system.
The former Secretary of Education chose to hypothesize aborting black babies instead of educating black babies to lower the crime rate because the first option produces more fear and the stark equation of “black” = “criminal.” As the former Drug Czar, this equation has been Bennett’s “E = MC2” – his fundamental concept in generating and fueling racial fears. In the mid-90s, during Clinton’s attack on welfare and poor people, the vernacular of racism changed to focus on “welfare mothers/welfare cheats” and “gang members,” the latter category consisting of “super-predators,” the word chosen by William Bennett to describe this new breed of extremely dangerous, hi-tech, unstoppable youths. Bennett made them out to be the T-1000s of thugs, so vicious that city police departments began compiling lists of “gang members” to watch out for. In reality, the only “super-predator” quality that most people on the lists possessed was being black.
Bennett boasted about filling the nation’s prisons and suggested that publicly beheading drug dealers would be “morally plausible.” He also teamed up with the equally despicable C. Dolores Tucker of the National Political Congress of Black Women in targeting “controversial music,” a thinly veiled code for rap. This puritan posse bullied Time Warner into dropping Interscope Records, which contained artists like Dr. Dre and Tupac Shakur, and helped implement Tipper Gore’s parental advisory stickers, which are disproportionately affixed to albums by black artists.
Bennett, author of The Book of Virtues, is, simply put, a gambling-addicted liar and hypocrite. While this “super-debtor” spread anxiety about “super-predators,” the facts showed that violent crime in all categories, including juvenile, was down. Is crime really a “black” problem, as Bennett implies? Ask serial killers, of whom 90 percent are white men. Or ask child molesters, a category in which there are two white offenders for every black one. Or ask drug abusers and drug dealers, of whom 100 percent are black men.
Oh wait, I got that last statistic wrong; what I meant was that 100 percent of black men are suspected drug abusers and drug dealers*. Jim Crow is alive and well in American drug policy, a policy built on lies, terror, and social control. A black man is about six times more likely than a white man to spend time in prison. Drug abuse violations are the top cause for arrest, numbering 1,678,200 in 2003. The number of inmates incarcerated for drug offenses has risen by 88,800 since 1983. Why is drug abuse so prevalent among blacks?
It’s not. The truth is that whites make up the vast majority of illegal drug users and the majority of drug dealers. In fact, the National Institute of Drug Abuse estimated that only 12 percent of drug users are black; yet, they make up nearly half of all drug possession arrests. Once arrested, the system gets even worse. Mandatory minimum sentences, the 100:1 sentencing ratio of crack cocaine to powder cocaine, racial profiling, Drug-Free School Zones in urban areas, and deplorable defense for the indigent all contribute to the system being stacked against the black defendant. Yet, we still fear the “super-predators” and the un-aborted black babies because William Bennett tells us to.
Bennett’s comments reflect the glaring hypocrisy and deceitful “morality” that festers at all the top government offices. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay was indicted for criminal conspiracy, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is being investigated for insider trading, Republican lobbying goons David Safavian and Jack Abramoff are facing indictments, and the investigation over the Valerie Plame leak has reached Rove, Libby and will soon go even higher.
“Morality” is often a clean, shiny veneer that hides the scum underneath. If you look at Bennett’s comments in the context of the conversation, they really aren’t the awful words they are made out to be. If you look at them in the context of his life and legacy, though, they are vile. And if you look at them in the context of a failed justice system, a prison nation, corrupt law enforcement, and the traditional value of American racism, they are tragic.
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