Or at least it's the cheapest shot.
American Urban Radio Networks White House correspondent April Ryan today indicted the Bush administration on race relations via Bill Bennett's recent remarks on abortion and black Americans, which apparently, she has taken out of context:
Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. President, the Bible speaks of goodwill towards the least of these. With that, how are you going to bridge the divide of poverty and race in this country beyond economics and home ownership, that after Hurricane Katrina and also the Bill Bennett statements? And also, how can the Republican Party gain the black vote -- more of the black vote in 2008, after these public relations fiascos?
Of course, Bennett is not a GOP official and has been out of government for quite a while. As a pro-life, conservative talk show host, Bennett recently found himself discussing and dismissing the economic argument posited by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner in their best-seller Freakonomics that high abortion rates among the poor can cut crime rates by lessening the number of unplanned, unwanted poor children who are likelier to commit crime in their adolescent years. As clumsy as Bennett may have worded his argument against abortion, Ryan knows better than to take it out of context and blow it into an indictment of race relations by the Bush administration and the GOP.
For more on Ryan, click here.
For a White House transcript of today's news conference, click here.
