More good news out of bad.

If a needlessly damaging hurricane can encourage reduction in pork-barrel spending, then perhaps a needlessly damaging radio-show comment can have some beneficial side-effects as well.

As you probably have read or heard by now, Bill Bennett illustrated a point on a radio show last week in a particularly stark way, and got himself into a bit of an embarrassing media mix-up as a result. Bennett was making a point about...well, I'm still not entirely sure what he thought he was saying, there is just enough ambiguity there to keep the fine elements of his logic hidden, but he clearly doesn't like the idea of defending abortion on utilitarian grounds, least of all arguments based on fallacious extensions of some statistical measures. It's a bit unclear whether he believes that the extraordinary measure of aborting all the unborn of a particular race or class actually could reduce the crime rate but it would be unconscionably amoral, whether he thinks it would be both ineffective and amoral, or whether he believes it is an absurd premise and not worth discussion, which happens to be my stance.

Rather than contribute to the over-reaction to this comment, I'd rather discuss some of the reaction to the reaction. In a nutshell, some have found occasion to express shock and dismay at Bennett's comment by deliberately mis-reading what he said. Either that or they actually do support aborting an entire race, which I doubt. There is no surprise here. The self-appointed speech police have always been eager to mis-read or strip comment from context when it suits there purpose. What is surprising, pleasantly so, is how many people have seen through this tactic.

James Taranto, in his Best of the Web column today, wondered if we are not seeing the beginning of the end of "PC" thinking.

So why do we see this as a sign of political correctness's decline? Well, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, we kept hearing from our liberal friends that what this country needs is an honest discussion of race. Of course, liberals who call for a discussion of race never actually want it to be honest. Rather, they want to engage in the old familiar ritual in which blacks air their grievances, white liberals trumpet their moral superiority, the rest of us shut up and listen, and dissenters are shamed and silenced (see John Conyers's and Wade Henderson's demands regarding Bennett, above).

Our sense, however, is that this old ritual no longer has the same power it once did, and that as a result, liberals actually are getting the honest discussion about race that they have long demanded. If so, their worst fears are coming true.

We're still miles away from that "open discussion", but perhaps we get a bit closer in each of these little dust-ups. At some level of society, especially at the Public Policy level, there is great danger in an subject that is too sensitive to be raised and discussed. Somewhere in this country there ought to be a group of people who are sufficiently open-minded and mature enough to discuss tough issues like race and abortion (Bennett managed to touch two "third-rail issues" in one comment!) without fainting, or running to the nearest news reporter for the ritual expressions of dismay. Very likely some of the people in such a discussion will say things that are challenging, but these are precisely the ideas that most need debate.

The statistical link between race and crime rates is not in doubt, but the correlation of that statistic with others, and the "meaning" of any apparent correlation are very much in doubt, and not just from a policy or moral consideration. I mean there are some simple statistical questions that need to be addressed. One cannot just take a single metric and apply it to other context or differing base scenarios. I worry that people make these intuitive links in there heads, but are too frightened to express these thoughts. This keeps our public discourse free from distressing observations, but it also allows common misconceptions and misunderstandings to persist.

Jeff Goldstein at Protein Wisdom

has the best analysis I've seen so far (Tip to Instapundit). Jeff's particularly hard on the Left, with some justification I'd say, but there are plenty of folks ready to enforce a conservative political-correctness.

And Bennett is precisely right: fear of being branded a racist simply should not keep us from discussing racial issues-though that is precisely the practical effect in a culture where the leveling of such charges is easy and carries with it almost no consequences for the person doing the accusing, even if the accusation is made in bad faith, or is based on the flimsiest of pretenses.

Doesn't it seem inherently absurd, to argue the "words matter", and yet pay so little attention to the exact meaning of a statement? I suspect that many of the more notorious "speech police" are really "Thought Police wannabes." What a person says is not really the issue; rather the issue is what they imagine a person thinks. Indeed a careful examination of a person's speech is often a hindrance, since they usually are far more reasonable than their accusers wish to admit.

In any case, I support neither position. Words matter more in some contexts than in others, and in many contexts words are exceptionally cheap and carelessly tossed about. A critical parsing of each utterance will only serve a base political purpose, it won't inform the listener or advance political discussion in a useful way. Someone speaking off-the-cuff on the radio should be allowed time to make his point in the stumbling and disconnected way that real people use in conversation, and still be cut some slack for unfortunate choices of words. This goes for speakers on the left, right and center. If you are after their ideas and not just political ammo, take the time to hear them out.