Bennet didn't have to say "black."

[skids]

He could have said "disadvantanged." Or "at risk." Or even just "poor." It would not have changed his rhetoric, and controversy would have been avoided.

But he instead said "black."

And therein lies the crux of the matter.

WRT this, everything else is just a distraction.

So just say: he didn't have to say "black" you know.

[knowbody0]

1. agree

[Splatter Phoenix]

2. Ouch.

Actually reasonable sounding.

But RePuBlIcAnS KARE ABUT BLCK PPL.

[TahitiNut]

3. It would've been interesting if he'd said "Italian" ...

... alluding to the stereotype of "Italian=mafia." :shrug:

[deutsey]

4. As a commentator said on KPFA

the neocons are trying, consciously or unconsciously, to plant the meme that there's a "criminal race" in America, just like the Nazis portrayed Jews as depraved criminals.

[kikiek]

5. He could have just said that kind of speculation would be difficult to

prove since he wouldn't want to say abortion did decrease crime rate. If he wanted to be truthful he could have said the Clinton policies deserve the credit. Better times for all equals less crime for all. The other one who should be raked over the coals is that Babe Buchanan. In typical repug fashion she said anyone who believed what he said was racist is stupid and that anyone with an education would know what he meant. He was framing it in Socrates fashion and it wasn't meant to be answered. Donna B did point out that argument didn't hold water. But talk about putting down people. She said everyone was stupid and uneducated. Personally I didn't ever study Philosophy, and I do quite well thank you.

[bridgit]

6. sure 'poor' will suffice the standard republican theme where...

they may want to come right out and say 'democratic', otherwise, an odd sort of social thinkers (Bennett being but one of their gurus) enabled far beyond their allotted time

[Gman]

7. I started to say you are wrong

stopped typing, then thought, "Yeah, you're probably right." Not many people would have paid attention. The reliable defenders of those less fortunate would have risen in outrage only to have their voices overwhelmed by the distraction of the day.

[Igel]

8. You're right. He didn't.

But the research he was looking at originated in how to deal with persistent problems in some black communities, and suggesting solutions to the legacy of racism. The problems aren't unique to certain black communities (but are disproportionately black).

It would have been politic to say 'people living in "dense" poverty"', but that would have gotten no traction at all. And it wouldn't have taken more than a few minutes for people to decode what that usually means.

[charlie]

9. Of course, he had to

To say "poor", "at risk", or "disadvantaged" would be agreement with an argument that he dismissed only a moment before. This is the gist of the Freakonomics theory:

"The millions of women most likely to have an abortion in the wake of Roe v. Wade -- poor, unmarried, and teenage mothers for whom illegal abortions had been too expensive or too hard to get -- were often... the very women whose children, if born, would have been much more likely than average to become criminals."

Bennett told the caller he didn't buy that. Then he posited a specific exception where it would be true -- if you aborted blacks.

Removing blacks to reduce crime was what he had in mind. Skin color wasn't superfluous to his argument, it was a part of it.