WEBVTT NOTE Walter Block, Second Guest Appearance on "Our Story" 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:08.000 Our story prides itself as being a people-oriented, community-driven media outlet. 2 00:00:08.000 --> 00:00:26.000 As a voice for the black community, our story labors around the clock to provide you with an up-to-the-minute account of events that are affecting as well as effecting our families and our communities. 3 00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:36.000 I want to take a moment to thank one of our viewers, Brother Eric, for suggesting that we attend the congressional hearings held at Dillard University last Thursday. 4 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:45.000 We filmed much of the hearing and will probably address the issues at the hearing and show the footage at another time. 5 00:00:45.000 --> 00:00:50.000 My comments concerning the congressional hearings are simply, 6 00:00:50.000 --> 00:01:19.000 This was one of at least five hearings held at the federal level. As in past hearings and probably future hearings as well, it only amounted to a road trip for the legislators and all expense paid for by taxpayers' money, road trip with very little if any positive results coming out of it for the victims. 7 00:01:20.000 --> 00:01:28.640 So, in my mind's eye, it was just another day wasted. 8 00:01:28.640 --> 00:01:35.080 The upside to all of this is our story was able to document for the people another exercise 9 00:01:35.080 --> 00:01:37.260 in futility. 10 00:01:37.260 --> 00:01:44.080 We appreciate the viewer's suggestions and try to fulfill as many requests as possible. 11 00:01:44.080 --> 00:01:51.760 We thank you for your suggestions and encourage you to keep the suggestions coming. 12 00:01:51.760 --> 00:01:59.120 Last week's program with Sheriff Harry Lee was a perfect example of the effects that 13 00:01:59.120 --> 00:02:02.300 affect our daily lives. 14 00:02:02.300 --> 00:02:08.080 This week's program will continue in that vein of disclosure, which will allow us to 15 00:02:08.080 --> 00:02:16.320 to see and understand the forces of evil that is waiting for us at every turn, hiding behind 16 00:02:16.320 --> 00:02:23.960 their ivory towers of education and their plantations of penal reform. 17 00:02:23.960 --> 00:02:30.680 We realize not every racist is as open as Harry Lee is. 18 00:02:30.680 --> 00:02:37.200 The majority racists are nestled safely in the closet, awaiting the sound of the bugle 19 00:02:37.200 --> 00:02:45.880 for another charge to battle. Hidden racism is the worst form of the virus. As the old 20 00:02:45.880 --> 00:02:57.000 saying goes, smiling faces sometimes tell lies. Beware of the pat on the back with the 21 00:02:57.000 --> 00:03:05.200 handshake that hides the snake. These are lyrics to a well-known song, lyrics that communicate 22 00:03:05.200 --> 00:03:13.200 The dangers of the evil that lurks within the minds of many men. 23 00:03:13.200 --> 00:03:22.120 This week, we are hosting Professor Walter Block, an economist at the University of Loyola. 24 00:03:22.120 --> 00:03:25.800 Professor Block was with us several months ago. 25 00:03:25.800 --> 00:03:31.580 After that presentation, I am sure we could get a debate over whether Professor Block 26 00:03:31.580 --> 00:03:34.040 is a racist or not. 27 00:03:34.040 --> 00:03:40.680 But we are not here tonight to debate that topic. You can be the judge of that. However, 28 00:03:40.680 --> 00:03:47.800 we are here tonight to debate whether legalizing drugs is a viable means of stopping the murder 29 00:03:47.800 --> 00:03:57.600 rate in New Orleans and is it productive or counterproductive for the black community. 30 00:03:57.600 --> 00:04:04.640 To give us the proper setting for tonight's debate, let us lay the foundation by rewinding 31 00:04:04.640 --> 00:04:10.880 for a moment to November 1st when Professor Block was a guest on our story. 32 00:04:10.880 --> 00:04:18.380 So the problem of racism. Look, suppose a black person is worth $10 an hour, and a white 33 00:04:18.380 --> 00:04:26.120 person is also worth $10 an hour. They're each equally productive. But due to racism, 34 00:04:26.120 --> 00:04:30.520 The white person is making $10 an hour, but the black person is only making $7 an hour. 35 00:04:30.520 --> 00:04:35.820 Well, if that's true, then the employer who's hiring him is making an extra $3 an hour profit. 36 00:04:35.820 --> 00:04:37.220 So that's okay? 37 00:04:37.220 --> 00:04:42.820 That's great, because then what will happen as a first step, let me just finish, 38 00:04:42.820 --> 00:04:47.020 because then what will happen is that the guy who hires the black worker under this scenario 39 00:04:47.020 --> 00:04:50.220 will put out of business the other guy, because he'll be able to underperson him. 40 00:04:50.220 --> 00:04:56.220 I'm supposed to support this philosophy of business? 41 00:04:56.220 --> 00:04:58.220 Yeah, it'll get rid of racism. 42 00:04:58.220 --> 00:05:01.220 No, how will it get rid of racism? 43 00:05:01.220 --> 00:05:05.220 I rest my case. 44 00:05:05.220 --> 00:05:13.220 What is important is a foundation from where the theory of legalizing drugs comes from. 45 00:05:13.220 --> 00:05:20.820 It is important to recognize the fact that the apple never falls far from the tree. 46 00:05:21.940 --> 00:05:26.580 If I may borrow a metaphor to describe tonight's debate. 47 00:05:27.700 --> 00:05:34.260 Tonight we are faced with a theory that legalizing drugs will in fact reduce the murder rates 48 00:05:34.260 --> 00:05:36.580 and crime rates in New Orleans. 49 00:05:36.580 --> 00:05:50.580 Professor Block's position is that the usual suspect solutions have all been tried, have not worked in the past, and will not help us now. 50 00:05:50.580 --> 00:06:17.580 He rejects the so-called conventional wisdoms of improving public schools, daycare, stiffer penalties, midnight basketball, social workers, religion, subsidizing parenting skills, and the introduction of citizenship and ethics classes for middle and high school students. 51 00:06:17.580 --> 00:06:24.580 According to Professor Block, they are all inept remedies that haven't worked. 52 00:06:24.580 --> 00:06:41.580 Let me remind our viewers that the black cultural revolution of the 60s and the 70s was a major turning point in the advancement of black awareness and black on black love, 53 00:06:41.580 --> 00:07:08.580 During which time a certain value of pride and passion overcame the young black men and women, as well as the not so young black men and women, which caused the black community to fill the streets, which is the forefront of America's pageantry, proclaiming, I'm black and I'm proud. 54 00:07:08.580 --> 00:07:21.580 James Brown, the Godfather of Soul, promoted the newfound freedom with a passion fit for the kings and queens from whence black people emerged. 55 00:07:21.580 --> 00:07:26.580 Few blacks are credited with spearheading a cultural revolution. 56 00:07:26.580 --> 00:07:35.580 Because of this basis, America's white media foresaw and demonstrated to the world. 57 00:07:35.580 --> 00:07:58.580 Just as the Civil Rights Movement was cast in the valley of the shadow of death, better known to America as the Women's Liberation Movement, so was the Black Cultural Revolution cast in the wastebasket known to corporate America as Foul Thirteen. 58 00:07:58.580 --> 00:08:17.580 No matter how hard blacks in America try to place their past behind them, by trying to give white America an opportunity to move away from its salty past by giving peace as well as freedom a chance, 59 00:08:17.580 --> 00:08:37.580 America stayed true to the red, the white and the blue by denying blacks an opportunity to accept the ill-fated ideology of love is the answer, don't worry about the question. 60 00:08:37.580 --> 00:08:47.820 With the so-called love-in period of America, America began down the road to the psychedelic shack, 61 00:08:47.820 --> 00:08:53.820 trying to prove to the world that is truly where it's at. 62 00:08:53.820 --> 00:08:59.740 So when someone, anyone, wants to discredit the failure of white America 63 00:08:59.740 --> 00:09:11.140 With the escape-goat psychology of conventional wisdom being the usual suspect solutions that have all been tried and failed, 64 00:09:11.140 --> 00:09:26.580 I say to you, me today and you tomorrow, you sat by and watched in great horror the dismantling and destruction of a great and mighty people. 65 00:09:26.580 --> 00:09:38.720 You sit today in your great white ivory towers, perched on St. Charles Street, as white privilege hails King Rex and Comus, 66 00:09:38.720 --> 00:09:50.180 the land of the free and the home of the brave, where political deals are spun and New Orleans policy is dictated from. 67 00:09:50.180 --> 00:09:59.720 Tonight, we are going to examine yet another proposed solution to the murder and crime rates of New Orleans. 68 00:09:59.720 --> 00:10:08.480 Before we get started, you sit back and before you get comfortable, I want you to grab your rain gear. 69 00:10:08.480 --> 00:10:12.780 Get your hip boots, because it's going to get deep in here tonight. 70 00:10:12.780 --> 00:10:16.420 It's going to get deep up in here, up in here tonight. 71 00:10:16.420 --> 00:10:26.500 Just keep in the back of your head what fire water, that's alcohol, did to the indigenous people of this continent. 72 00:10:26.500 --> 00:10:38.940 So sit back and listen to General George Armstrong Custer, I'm sorry, I mean, Professor Walter Block of Loyola University. 73 00:10:38.940 --> 00:10:48.980 Professor Block, welcome to our story and tell us how legalizing drugs is going to decrease the murder and crime rate. 74 00:10:48.980 --> 00:10:56.660 Well, let me first thank you for that exhilarating introduction. That was magnificent. 75 00:10:56.660 --> 00:11:05.220 I think we have a gigantic problem here. There are young black men shooting each other down. 76 00:11:05.220 --> 00:11:10.420 In New Orleans, for a while, at the beginning of this year, it was pretty much one a day. 77 00:11:10.420 --> 00:11:20.620 Happily, we haven't kept up with that pace, but still, there are young black men, not just in New Orleans, but all over the country, shooting each other down. 78 00:11:20.620 --> 00:11:28.520 It's a horror, and nobody seems to want to do much about it. 79 00:11:28.520 --> 00:11:35.520 We rely on the old midnight basketball and education and ethics courses and stuff like that. 80 00:11:35.520 --> 00:11:38.520 But we've been doing that for years and years and years. 81 00:11:38.520 --> 00:11:49.520 Happily, we have a historical episode from which we can learn, namely the prohibition of alcohol in the 30s. 82 00:11:49.520 --> 00:11:57.520 And during the prohibition of alcohol, it wasn't black people so much killing each other over alcohol. 83 00:11:57.520 --> 00:12:03.520 Alcohol was Italian people, the mafia and others. They were shooting each other down in the street too. 84 00:12:03.520 --> 00:12:11.520 And, happily, we legalized alcohol. And nowadays, you know, nobody's shooting anybody. 85 00:12:11.520 --> 00:12:16.520 Schenley and Johnny Walker don't fire bomb each other. 86 00:12:16.520 --> 00:12:23.520 Alcohol is still a medical problem, and it's a horrible medical problem, but it's only a medical problem. 87 00:12:23.520 --> 00:12:27.520 are not also a social problem that leads to death. 88 00:12:27.520 --> 00:12:31.520 Now, before I go any further, in terms of the legalization of drugs, 89 00:12:31.520 --> 00:12:35.520 I think we absolutely have to keep distinct 90 00:12:35.520 --> 00:12:39.520 the difference between legalizing, which I favor, and using, 91 00:12:39.520 --> 00:12:43.520 which I don't favor. I do not favor using marijuana, cocaine, 92 00:12:43.520 --> 00:12:47.520 heroin, any of those things, those addictive drugs. I think they're 93 00:12:47.520 --> 00:12:51.520 poisons, some slow, some fast. I certainly oppose 94 00:12:51.520 --> 00:12:56.280 Is anyone using it? I don't use it. I hope no one here in our audience or in our studio 95 00:12:56.280 --> 00:13:02.220 uses it because I think these are a tragedy to use these things. 96 00:13:02.220 --> 00:13:08.600 Draino too is pretty bad, as is rat poison. Yet we legalize these things even though they're 97 00:13:08.600 --> 00:13:14.100 very harmful. So you have to distinguish between prohibition and legalization on the one hand 98 00:13:14.100 --> 00:13:17.160 and the use thereof on the other hand. 99 00:13:17.160 --> 00:13:22.160 Not only does the present law of prohibition of drugs 100 00:13:23.740 --> 00:13:28.340 lead to murders of disproportionately young black men, 101 00:13:28.340 --> 00:13:31.100 but also to great incarceration rates. 102 00:13:31.100 --> 00:13:32.820 My understanding of the statistics 103 00:13:32.820 --> 00:13:36.140 is that some 60% of all prisoners in the whole country, 104 00:13:37.100 --> 00:13:39.900 and the US incarcerates a much higher percentage of people 105 00:13:39.900 --> 00:13:41.380 than many other countries, 106 00:13:41.380 --> 00:14:11.380 Some 60% of it is due to drugs. And in the prison population, black people are wildly overrepresented on a statistical basis. Blacks are only some 12 or 13 or 14% of the entire population. I think there's something like half of the prison population. So this present system is a vicious, depraved horror for the black community. And I'm hoping to convince you people and the people in the audience that the black community 107 00:14:11.380 --> 00:14:41.380 Okay, we're going to see if we can't muster up and grab a few of them, you peoples, and bring them up and have them to respond to you, but we have with us this evening, Kimberly Parker, who is the chair of the Safe Streets, who is battling every day with trying to find a way to get to the bottom of this, 108 00:14:41.380 --> 00:15:11.380 Resolution to the Problems with Crime and Murder. Welcome to our story. Once again, you're no stranger to our story. Kimberly, thank you for taking the time to be with us. I ask you to come so that you could respond as well to some of these thoughts and theories that our good professor over here has. The floor is yours. Okay, well I agree with Professor Block about a couple of things. I believe that the criminalization of drugs is a huge problem and that the 109 00:15:11.380 --> 00:15:33.380 The incarceration rate of African-American people is also a huge problem, but I think that when you look at the numbers of people who are incarcerated for drug offenses, that primarily you'll see that they're users who are incarcerated, not people who are drug dealers or are the heads of any major drug organizations. 110 00:15:33.380 --> 00:15:39.220 What's happening is that someone with a vial of crack is being arrested and incarcerated 111 00:15:39.220 --> 00:15:45.320 for a long period of time, and that's someone who has a drug problem, and they're being 112 00:15:45.320 --> 00:15:48.500 put in jail because they have a drug problem. 113 00:15:48.500 --> 00:15:54.900 The second thing that I wanted to address is your assertion that we've tried all of 114 00:15:54.900 --> 00:15:56.180 the usual solutions. 115 00:15:56.180 --> 00:16:02.220 I would argue that we have claimed to have tried the usual solutions, but we haven't 116 00:16:02.220 --> 00:16:06.220 I haven't tried any of them in a directed and effective manner. 117 00:16:06.220 --> 00:16:10.220 I think you would agree that we have a dysfunctional police department, 118 00:16:10.220 --> 00:16:14.220 we have a dysfunctional district attorney's office. They don't work effectively 119 00:16:14.220 --> 00:16:18.220 one to the other, they don't work together very well, 120 00:16:18.220 --> 00:16:22.220 and they don't efficiently address the crime problem. 121 00:16:22.220 --> 00:16:26.220 So I think that a lot of what we're seeing is 122 00:16:26.220 --> 00:16:30.220 the results of their inability to incarcerate the people 123 00:16:30.220 --> 00:16:36.060 So, who are violent, who are being released on 701s, you know, after they've been held 124 00:16:36.060 --> 00:16:39.580 for 60 days and they haven't been charged yet. 125 00:16:39.580 --> 00:16:45.780 So, I think that what we really need to do is to figure out, are we employing the best 126 00:16:45.780 --> 00:16:48.460 ways in the systems that we already have in place? 127 00:16:48.460 --> 00:16:52.740 Are we using the best practices available to address the crime problem? 128 00:16:52.740 --> 00:16:57.580 If we discover that we are using the best practices and we're still getting the outcome 129 00:16:57.580 --> 00:17:01.980 that we're getting I think absolutely I'm with you it's time to start looking at 130 00:17:01.980 --> 00:17:07.620 something else something perhaps more radical but until we've actually tried 131 00:17:07.620 --> 00:17:12.940 the solutions that we claim to have tried and try them in a manner that makes 132 00:17:12.940 --> 00:17:19.020 sense and that is the result of research I think we're never going to really know 133 00:17:19.020 --> 00:17:24.460 if an effective police department that's not dysfunctional and that's not corrupt 134 00:17:24.460 --> 00:17:54.460 And before you respond, I want to let our listeners know that the phone lines are open and we're welcoming your input, your questions and your comments here. You can become a part of this as well. I want to also respond to the fact that, yes, 135 00:17:54.460 --> 00:18:04.460 The figures I have is over 60% of all the prisoners in the U.S. are black. 136 00:18:04.460 --> 00:18:07.460 But I think you were making it there in for drugs. 137 00:18:07.460 --> 00:18:21.460 But the problems that I'm seeing as well is that the claim that the usual solutions that have been employed and not working have not been employed in earnest. 138 00:18:21.460 --> 00:18:29.460 and that is a big problem. So suppose we get started there and then we'll work our way through this maze. 139 00:18:29.460 --> 00:18:37.460 Well, I don't think that Kimberly and I have gigantic differences between us because I agree with her, I agree with you, 140 00:18:37.460 --> 00:18:44.460 that the usual suspects or the usual principles or the usual policies should be continued. 141 00:18:44.460 --> 00:18:50.460 I'm not saying let's stop trying to reform police or let's stop trying to reform the DA 142 00:18:50.460 --> 00:18:55.060 or Let's Stop Midnight Basketball or Ethics Courses or any of that stuff. 143 00:18:55.060 --> 00:18:58.360 I'm saying keep going, try to do it better. 144 00:18:58.360 --> 00:18:59.860 And I'm sort of putting it to the side. 145 00:18:59.860 --> 00:19:01.960 So we agree that this is good stuff. 146 00:19:01.960 --> 00:19:04.760 I mean, no one is really saying let's stop that. 147 00:19:04.760 --> 00:19:10.060 But what I'm saying is that if we can do better on that, God bless, let's do better. 148 00:19:10.060 --> 00:19:17.260 But let's, given that the problem is so horrendous, let's try something more radical. 149 00:19:17.260 --> 00:19:20.060 In addition, not instead of, but in addition. 150 00:19:20.060 --> 00:19:23.620 and i'm saying that the time is now you're saying well if we try and we get 151 00:19:23.620 --> 00:19:27.980 through and we do it well and it still doesn't work then in a couple years we 152 00:19:27.980 --> 00:19:32.580 can try this i'm saying right now people are dying like flies and it's 153 00:19:32.580 --> 00:19:37.180 disproportionately blacks although i i don't care color white black green blue 154 00:19:37.180 --> 00:19:43.900 it's just human beings who are dying and being put in jail and being hurt and to 155 00:19:43.900 --> 00:19:47.420 me it's it's a gigantic crime that sort of cries out for an immediate solution 156 00:19:47.420 --> 00:20:07.420 I agree that it is dramatic and we need to have a solution immediately. I think I would just question whether or not there's any definitive evidence that the majority of the crime or the majority of the murders are drug related, number one. 157 00:20:07.420 --> 00:20:22.420 And number two, I wonder, once you legalize drugs, now you have a whole cadre of former drug dealers. They're uneducated, they're unskilled. 158 00:20:22.420 --> 00:20:27.420 So the reason that they went into the drug trade in the first place is because they're uneducated and unskilled. 159 00:20:27.420 --> 00:20:32.420 So what option will then be available to them that is a legal option? 160 00:20:32.420 --> 00:20:38.700 So, what's going to prevent them from turning to another illegal operation, which would 161 00:20:38.700 --> 00:20:43.500 continue the crime, it just would be another source of revenue for them, another illegal 162 00:20:43.500 --> 00:20:45.700 source of revenue would be there. 163 00:20:45.700 --> 00:20:49.620 I think that what we really need to address are the systemic reasons why people end up 164 00:20:49.620 --> 00:20:51.380 dealing drugs in the first place. 165 00:20:51.380 --> 00:20:57.780 I think that if you had an education and if there were job opportunities available that 166 00:20:57.780 --> 00:21:02.740 that paid you more than minimum wage, perhaps you wouldn't choose to sell drugs in your 167 00:21:02.740 --> 00:21:09.380 neighborhood if there were other options for you. But if you're uneducated and unskilled 168 00:21:09.380 --> 00:21:15.500 and there's another drug deal in your neighborhood saying you can make $1,000 a week, who wouldn't 169 00:21:15.500 --> 00:21:21.740 do that? I mean, so I guess my question is what will happen to these people who are involved 170 00:21:21.740 --> 00:21:26.240 in this criminal activity when you remove the criminal element of it so it's no longer 171 00:21:26.240 --> 00:21:56.240 Before I answer your question, let me ask you a quick question. Yes or no answer if you want, although you're not limited to yes or no. Do you favor the re-prohibition of alcohol, wine, beer, and stuff like that? No. Good. Okay. Quiet. I'm kidding, of course. Imagine we're back in 1935, and alcohol is prohibited. And I'm saying, well, we should legalize it, because it'll save us money. 172 00:21:56.240 --> 00:22:05.240 and save lives and people won't die from bathtub gin and would be the equivalent of impure drugs nowadays and people wouldn't be thrown in jail. 173 00:22:05.240 --> 00:22:16.240 And you're saying, but what will all these people who are now in the liquor gangs and have backward stills and bathtub gin people, what will they do? 174 00:22:16.240 --> 00:22:26.240 Therefore we shouldn't legalize it, but you wouldn't say that, because you've already said that you favor the present legalization of alcohol. 175 00:22:26.240 --> 00:22:31.240 So it's the same sort of a thing. In other words, there's always the problem of what will the criminals do 176 00:22:31.240 --> 00:22:38.240 once we cut their legs out from under them and we no longer have need for criminals in the alcohol business? 177 00:22:38.240 --> 00:22:42.240 Well, some of them may be reformed. I don't know. 178 00:22:42.240 --> 00:22:45.240 Like the Mafia? 179 00:22:45.240 --> 00:22:50.240 Look, what the Mafia does is they do things that is prohibited. 180 00:22:50.240 --> 00:22:55.240 They do sex, they do pornography, they do drugs, they do gambling when it's illegal, 181 00:22:55.240 --> 00:22:58.240 they do garbage because it's mainly a governmental thing, 182 00:22:58.240 --> 00:23:01.240 but they don't do pens or cough drops or wristwatches, 183 00:23:01.240 --> 00:23:04.240 because those things are legal and they can't compete. 184 00:23:04.240 --> 00:23:06.240 Wait a minute now, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. 185 00:23:06.240 --> 00:23:11.240 Now we understand that that might have been true 70 years ago, 186 00:23:11.240 --> 00:23:15.040 But today, that is as far backwards as it possibly can be. 187 00:23:15.040 --> 00:23:25.740 We know that organized crime probably has more legitimate business than legitimate business has in America. 188 00:23:25.740 --> 00:23:35.340 And the problem being is the fact that you're saying that when they stopped the prohibition of alcohol, 189 00:23:35.340 --> 00:23:41.540 that it did not create social deaths. 190 00:23:41.540 --> 00:23:45.340 But what I'm saying is, what about all the automobile accidents we're having 191 00:23:45.340 --> 00:23:48.240 that are due because of alcohol? 192 00:23:48.240 --> 00:23:53.940 What about the people that are dying because of medical reasons due to alcohol? 193 00:23:53.940 --> 00:24:02.140 There are so many deaths that on the surface are not accounted or accredited to alcohol, 194 00:24:02.140 --> 00:24:07.100 but when you begin to dig into the history or you dig into the information 195 00:24:07.100 --> 00:24:08.500 you find out that 196 00:24:08.500 --> 00:24:11.420 alcohol is at the root of that death 197 00:24:11.420 --> 00:24:15.340 and we need to understand that because 198 00:24:15.340 --> 00:24:16.180 uh... 199 00:24:16.180 --> 00:24:17.540 secrums and 200 00:24:17.540 --> 00:24:20.900 anhyzer bush and all the rest of these 201 00:24:20.900 --> 00:24:22.860 mafiosus 202 00:24:22.860 --> 00:24:24.160 that are in 203 00:24:24.160 --> 00:24:26.900 legitimate business today 204 00:24:26.900 --> 00:24:28.540 are keeping 205 00:24:28.540 --> 00:24:30.140 the death rates 206 00:24:30.140 --> 00:24:43.280 They're keeping the problems of the crime rates, they're keeping the problems that these alcohols are creating quiet so they can continue to make above board legitimate money. 207 00:24:43.280 --> 00:24:55.000 Let me ask you the same question I asked Kimberly. Do you favor going back to the previous situation, the previous legal situation and prohibiting beer, wine and alcohol? 208 00:24:55.000 --> 00:24:58.200 Yes, I'm going to tell you I am, and I'm going to tell you why. 209 00:24:58.200 --> 00:25:01.800 If it's not readily available, 210 00:25:01.800 --> 00:25:11.100 you are not going to allow the entire population to give them carte blanche to it. 211 00:25:11.100 --> 00:25:14.900 It's like, it's just like, well, it's like the drugs today. 212 00:25:14.900 --> 00:25:17.000 The drugs are not legal, 213 00:25:17.000 --> 00:25:23.400 and you have a small percentage of the population, outside of the black population, 214 00:25:23.400 --> 00:25:27.920 that's consumers of illegal drugs. 215 00:25:27.920 --> 00:25:30.960 You don't really have a large black population 216 00:25:30.960 --> 00:25:34.720 that's consumer of illegal drugs. 217 00:25:34.720 --> 00:25:38.880 But it appears that way because that's all the media shows us, 218 00:25:38.880 --> 00:25:41.480 our black folks in the drug trade. 219 00:25:41.480 --> 00:25:43.560 Now, let me make another point. 220 00:25:43.560 --> 00:25:45.840 Harry Lee was here last week. 221 00:25:45.840 --> 00:25:49.520 Harry Lee admitted the majority of people 222 00:25:49.520 --> 00:25:53.080 that get arrested and locked up and put in jail 223 00:25:53.080 --> 00:26:19.080 for Drugs or Black. But there's no black person that they have been able to surface or find that controls, transports, manufactures drugs. The only ones that are going to jail are your street level involved folk and they happen to be black because white folk aren't taking the risk. 224 00:26:19.080 --> 00:26:30.080 Well, I think you're making my point. First of all, let me say that I'm, I find it highly problematic that you would favor going back to prohibition of alcohol. 225 00:26:30.080 --> 00:26:39.080 See, right now, alcohol is only one problem. It's a medical problem. And also if people drive while drinking and kill other people, that's part of the medical problem. 226 00:26:39.080 --> 00:26:45.340 problem. And I certainly favor treating drugs like alcohol. In other words, while I want 227 00:26:45.340 --> 00:26:50.580 to legalize drugs, I don't want you behind the wheel under the influence of drugs any 228 00:26:50.580 --> 00:26:56.820 more than I want you or me under the influence of alcohol behind the wheel. So drinking while 229 00:26:56.820 --> 00:27:02.740 driving or drinking while drugging should be illegal. But the point is that right now, 230 00:27:02.740 --> 00:27:06.940 alcohol is only a medical problem. It's not also a social problem. People are not being 231 00:27:06.940 --> 00:27:12.940 Drugs are being killed like flies over it, and what I'm saying is that drugs right now is a double problem. 232 00:27:12.940 --> 00:27:16.940 It's a medical problem, and it's a social problem where people are being killed. 233 00:27:16.940 --> 00:27:27.940 And I have no solution to the medical problem except, I don't know, alcoholics anonymous or narcotics anonymous or doctors or psychiatrists, the usual kind of thing. 234 00:27:27.940 --> 00:27:31.940 But I do have a solution to the other one, and that's important too. 235 00:27:31.940 --> 00:27:36.940 We shouldn't only look at the drugs or the alcohol as a medical problem, horrendous as those problems are. 236 00:27:36.940 --> 00:27:40.940 We should also look at this horrendous death problem. 237 00:27:40.940 --> 00:27:45.940 I agree that we have to look at it from very different perspectives. 238 00:27:45.940 --> 00:27:50.940 I think that it's important to consider the medical problem and the criminal problem. 239 00:27:50.940 --> 00:27:57.940 But I also think there's another problem that you're leaving out, which is the systemic reform problem, 240 00:27:57.940 --> 00:28:06.940 The breakdown of systems, because you have to talk about why people are taking drugs and why people are selling drugs. 241 00:28:06.940 --> 00:28:16.940 Because if you remove just drugs as a criminal activity that's available, if we're talking in the context of fighting crime, 242 00:28:16.940 --> 00:28:23.940 I don't see necessarily that there's going to be a decrease in crime. There might be a temporary decrease in crime, 243 00:28:23.940 --> 00:28:33.940 But these people who are engaged in this illegal activity will move on to another illegal activity because they have no skills, they have no education, they have no job opportunities. 244 00:28:33.940 --> 00:28:45.940 So if we're talking about legalizing drugs in order to fight crime, the reason why you have so many drug dealers in the first place is because there are no job opportunities and poor education. 245 00:28:45.940 --> 00:28:51.940 So if there are still no job opportunities and no education, what are these people going to do? 246 00:28:51.940 --> 00:28:58.900 do. They're certainly not going to go to get a straight job at Walmart or whatever and 247 00:28:58.900 --> 00:29:04.620 make $5 an hour. They're going to do some other illegal activity that generates the 248 00:29:04.620 --> 00:29:09.300 same income that the drug trade did, which is going to result in turf wars and all the 249 00:29:09.300 --> 00:29:15.580 same. And I think with the repeal of prohibition, you saw the same thing with the mafia. They 250 00:29:15.580 --> 00:29:21.580 moved to other criminal activities in order to make up the difference. And as you see 251 00:29:21.580 --> 00:29:25.880 Money with the Mafia now, even though they're in the decline, they're doing identity theft 252 00:29:25.880 --> 00:29:31.380 and credit card fraud and all kinds of other illegal activity that still has a criminal, 253 00:29:31.380 --> 00:29:40.380 a violent component. So I think that you remove drugs as one illegal opportunity to make money. 254 00:29:40.380 --> 00:29:43.660 People are going to move to something else until you give them options to do something 255 00:29:43.660 --> 00:29:44.660 differently. 256 00:29:44.660 --> 00:29:48.580 Well, I certainly favor giving them options, but we can't solve all problems in this one 257 00:29:48.580 --> 00:30:18.580 and Show. And I'm just trying to put the blinders on and focus on one problem, and that is the horrendous death rate, mainly to young black men, but to other people too. Let's talk about the economics of it a little bit, because I disagree profoundly with your idea that it's sort of like pressing water down in a bathtub. If you press it down here, it'll come up there, so you're no better off. But you have to, if you're trying to make the argument for legalization of drugs, you're 258 00:30:18.580 --> 00:30:25.580 So you're going to have to overcome the obstacle that she's brought up to you. 259 00:30:25.580 --> 00:30:32.580 I mean, before you can even consider legalizing drugs, you've got to satisfy that question. 260 00:30:32.580 --> 00:30:33.580 That's what I'm trying to do. 261 00:30:33.580 --> 00:30:34.580 All right, go ahead. 262 00:30:34.580 --> 00:30:38.580 And the way I'm trying to answer this is through the economics of it. 263 00:30:38.580 --> 00:30:45.580 Now, the economics of it, if I had a blackboard, I sort of feel naked without a blackboard because I'm a professor, I have to draw stuff. 264 00:30:45.580 --> 00:31:15.580 The point is we have supply and demand, and ordinarily, if it were legal, the supply would be shifted to the right or much greater, because marijuana particularly, and even poppy seeds are like weeds, you know, it's not even like asparagus, where you have to take care of it, and asparagus is expensive. These things are like weeds, you just sort of put the seed in, you have to back off, because they'll sort of attack you. The economics of it is that right now, it's hard 265 00:31:15.580 --> 00:31:24.580 Tenobe is it's illegal, but it costs about $2,000 a week to support a mature habit. 266 00:31:24.580 --> 00:31:28.860 The estimate is that if it were legalized it would cost $10 a week, which is what a candy 267 00:31:28.860 --> 00:31:33.140 bar habit costs. You can buy two candy bars a day. In other words, no one would commit 268 00:31:33.140 --> 00:31:37.000 a crime. It would be silly to commit crimes to get $10 a week. 269 00:31:37.000 --> 00:31:38.500 People do it every day. 270 00:31:38.500 --> 00:31:43.820 No, no, no. Some people do it, but people have to commit more crimes to get $2,000 a 271 00:32:13.820 --> 00:32:18.400 And maybe, although I doubt it, I think some of them wouldn't do it, but I try to deal 272 00:32:18.400 --> 00:32:23.500 with this problem with the mafia, you know, with regard to prohibition of alcohol. 273 00:32:23.500 --> 00:32:29.000 But the point is that at one fell swoop, if we legalize it, all of these addicts who now 274 00:32:29.000 --> 00:32:32.940 are in a horrible situation, they have to get $2,000 a week. 275 00:32:32.940 --> 00:32:36.700 And the main way that they're going to get that is by creating mayhem in society. 276 00:32:36.700 --> 00:32:40.740 Well, if it's only $10 a week, then they don't have to commit as much mayhem. 277 00:32:40.740 --> 00:32:57.240 The cops have gotten more guns than these people. They'd get shot, they'd brutalize their victims. All this social disarray would disappear, just as it did with alcohol. 278 00:32:57.240 --> 00:33:04.740 And another point that I want to make is, one of my favorite characters, Lenny Bruce, I don't know if anyone knows him anymore, but I'm a big fan of his, 279 00:33:04.740 --> 00:33:13.740 He died not of an overdose, but of impure heroin, and the cops knew that it was impure and they didn't stop him from doing it because they didn't much like him. 280 00:33:13.740 --> 00:33:16.740 Well, we have impure drugs now. 281 00:33:16.740 --> 00:33:18.740 You're getting a hot shot, in other words. 282 00:33:18.740 --> 00:33:25.740 Yes, but if Pfizer was doing it, or a squib, or somebody like that, and you went to a pharmacy to get your drugs, look, suppose... 283 00:33:25.740 --> 00:33:28.740 Wait a minute, now, that happens every day as well, but we've got a call. 284 00:33:28.740 --> 00:33:30.740 Oh, okay. 285 00:33:30.740 --> 00:33:33.740 You're on our story, question or comment, thank you for calling. 286 00:33:33.740 --> 00:33:46.740 Yohuru, African people who are watching the show would absolutely be totally misguided 287 00:33:46.740 --> 00:33:52.980 by the simple fact that we have a professor on the show who's talking about legalizing 288 00:33:52.980 --> 00:34:01.980 drugs. And the majority of our people do not understand the agenda behind individuals such 289 00:34:01.980 --> 00:34:07.380 Such as this professor when he talks about legalizing drugs. There are so many things 290 00:34:07.380 --> 00:34:14.060 that we have to take into account. The first thing I want to say is that professor, all 291 00:34:14.060 --> 00:34:23.900 black people are not dumb, deaf and blind. There are some that can think just like you 292 00:34:23.900 --> 00:34:32.900 that are able to decipher the language that you're speaking because this drug thing that 293 00:34:32.900 --> 00:34:39.740 you're speaking about, it would appear that this is a black problem. 294 00:34:39.740 --> 00:34:41.940 It is not a black problem. 295 00:34:41.940 --> 00:34:44.740 It goes beyond being a black problem. 296 00:34:44.740 --> 00:34:49.340 The sisters said the drug dealers are no education illiterate. 297 00:34:49.340 --> 00:34:52.660 Well, we have to go above their heads. 298 00:34:52.660 --> 00:35:00.540 Actually, the real drug dealers are not illiterate. They are on Wall Street, and they are in the 299 00:35:00.540 --> 00:35:07.540 business of the stock market trade. When you say people like Whack and Hutt, you mention 300 00:35:07.540 --> 00:35:14.540 about the prison population, more than half is black people. The more people you get that 301 00:35:14.540 --> 00:35:23.300 The dispossessed, disadvantaged behind these walls, the bigger and bigger their pockets 302 00:35:23.300 --> 00:35:25.900 get of the players on Wall Street. 303 00:35:25.900 --> 00:35:30.020 Okay, drugs is a chemical war on African people. 304 00:35:30.020 --> 00:35:33.820 It is a chemical war on African people. 305 00:35:33.820 --> 00:35:41.460 You have a global satellite system that you can use to spy on nations all over the world 306 00:35:41.460 --> 00:35:49.700 and send actual photo shots down to the T of buildings or plants that this country accuses 307 00:35:49.700 --> 00:35:57.180 of Iraq or any other country of producing weapons of mass destruction, yet you have 308 00:35:57.180 --> 00:36:07.060 this global system, satellite system, you cannot use the same satellite system to actually 309 00:36:07.060 --> 00:36:16.560 Locate the poppy fields and coca leaf plantations and wipe that whole industry out. But yeah, 310 00:36:16.560 --> 00:36:23.500 you want to make it seem like this is a problem, a local problem, when it is a federal problem. 311 00:36:23.500 --> 00:36:29.900 Now, you mentioned, something was mentioned about the mafia and all these things that 312 00:36:29.900 --> 00:36:33.620 they, you know, that they were warning them, so you legalize it and it stopped this. That 313 00:36:33.620 --> 00:36:37.740 That is a total illusion in a total other different part of the world. 314 00:36:37.740 --> 00:36:41.740 And that same part of the world you spoke of, it's called the Knights of Malta. 315 00:36:41.740 --> 00:36:49.580 And when you talk about the Knights of Malta, what you got, CIA, the Vatican, the Jesuits, 316 00:36:49.580 --> 00:36:57.140 and I'm quite sure you know who Loyola is, Ignatius of Loyola, okay, and Wall Street. 317 00:36:57.140 --> 00:37:02.180 All these are players in the drug industry, so there's no way you're going to get rid 318 00:37:02.180 --> 00:37:18.300 Well, I certainly agree with the caller that it's not just a local problem, it's not even 319 00:37:18.300 --> 00:37:22.700 a national problem, it's a world problem and it even feeds into terrorism because a lot 320 00:37:22.700 --> 00:37:28.340 of the terrorists are getting a lot of money from illegal drugs. But that's about all I 321 00:37:28.340 --> 00:37:58.340 Well, I agree with this gentleman on, and, you know, he talks about race and racism and black people. It's not a black problem. It's a human problem. It just so happens that blacks are disproportionately being hurt by it. So it seems to me that if the black community has the best interests of black people at heart, they would take what I'm saying very seriously, and not take it as racism, but take it as an attempt to help. 322 00:37:58.340 --> 00:38:25.340 Let's look at the racism about this. You had mentioned the economics question, the question of the monies, and if you attack that, that question is moot now, because it's not about $2,000 a week or a day. That was maybe 15, 20 years ago. 323 00:38:25.340 --> 00:38:38.340 The government worked with other concerns including the World Health Organization to create what is now called crack. 324 00:38:38.340 --> 00:38:48.340 To make sure that they could deliver a very cheap substance that would put a person on it for life. 325 00:38:48.340 --> 00:38:53.340 That is genocide. That is racism. 326 00:38:53.340 --> 00:39:01.340 But no one is talking about the racism and the genocide that drugs are utilizing. 327 00:39:01.340 --> 00:39:06.340 There are two sources of the genocide. One is the use of drugs, and here I agree with you. 328 00:39:06.340 --> 00:39:10.340 And I did say that I oppose this bitterly, and I think people shouldn't use it. 329 00:39:10.340 --> 00:39:13.340 And to the extent that they use it, it's horrible. 330 00:39:13.340 --> 00:39:19.340 And I agree with you that we should do everything we can, narcotics, anonymous, what have you, to get people off that. 331 00:39:19.340 --> 00:39:49.340 This is one problem. But I'm talking about a different problem, because I have no way to solve that one. But I do have a way to solve this other one, and this other one is black people are shooting each other down, the black, young black men particularly, but other races too, but disproportionately black, are shooting each other down in the streets. I don't say that the major cause of black death is this, but this is a big problem, and to just sort of ignore this seems horrendous and seems racist to me. 332 00:39:49.340 --> 00:39:58.020 Another thing that our people need to understand, there was a man named Thomas Smoltus in the 333 00:39:58.020 --> 00:40:04.300 late 18th, early 19th century, and he spoke about this overpopulation. 334 00:40:04.300 --> 00:40:07.780 When he spoke about overpopulation, he wasn't speaking about white folk, he was speaking 335 00:40:07.780 --> 00:40:10.900 about black people in particular, and people of color. 336 00:40:10.900 --> 00:40:17.340 So what he says is three ways you can control this so-called overpopulation, war, famine, 337 00:40:17.340 --> 00:40:18.340 and birth control. 338 00:40:18.340 --> 00:40:27.060 The drug, the new crack epidemic, which began with the CIA and freeway, Ricky Ross, in South 339 00:40:27.060 --> 00:40:32.180 Central California, the money they was using to overthrow the government in Nicaragua. 340 00:40:32.180 --> 00:40:33.180 Okay? 341 00:40:33.180 --> 00:40:38.340 Now, when you talk about that, the chemical warfare is just a plank, another plank of 342 00:40:38.340 --> 00:40:40.900 what's called Malthusian politics. 343 00:40:40.900 --> 00:40:45.940 And this professor has left all of that out when he talks about the drug situation and 344 00:40:45.940 --> 00:40:47.540 legalizing drugs. 345 00:40:47.540 --> 00:40:53.540 will accelerate the genocide of African people and that is the ultimate motive. It's called 346 00:40:53.540 --> 00:40:57.940 fear of a black planet and population control because white people are the slowest growing 347 00:40:57.940 --> 00:41:02.300 population on the face of this planet. Ask the German government. They recently wanted 348 00:41:02.300 --> 00:41:08.580 to pay parents in Germany to have more babies. They gave them incentives to have more babies. 349 00:41:08.580 --> 00:41:14.540 Okay? That is the ultimate agenda of what this professor is saying. Your Horace Assange. 350 00:41:14.540 --> 00:41:29.540 This gentleman reads Malthus differently than I do, but the point is he's interpreting me as saying that I want black people or all people, but particularly black people, to use this, but I try to distance myself from that. He is 180 degrees off of what I'm saying. 351 00:41:29.540 --> 00:41:39.540 He is interpreting me as saying that black people should use this stuff. I'm not saying that. I'm just saying that if they use it, they shouldn't also be put in jail and they shouldn't be killed. 352 00:41:39.540 --> 00:41:44.900 Let's put it in a different perspective for you. Maybe you understand this. 353 00:41:44.900 --> 00:41:49.380 You're a professor at a leading university. 354 00:41:49.380 --> 00:41:59.420 You are championing the cause of legalizing drugs as a supposed method and means of lowering the murder rate in New Orleans. 355 00:41:59.420 --> 00:42:08.380 When you could be using your staff, you could be using your resources to attack the problem, 356 00:42:08.380 --> 00:42:25.380 The heart of the problem, going after the government, going after the businesses that are reaping the big profits from this because so-called, quote-unquote, legitimate businesses are the ones that are bringing this stuff in here. 357 00:42:25.380 --> 00:42:33.380 So if you're going to go after somebody to make a change, then you need to go after the people that are bringing this stuff in. 358 00:42:33.380 --> 00:42:40.980 And someone from your platform would definitely catch the attention of, as he was saying, 359 00:42:40.980 --> 00:42:48.380 viewers and others in a professional community to move on this. 360 00:42:48.380 --> 00:42:52.780 I think we're not communicating because my plan, and it's not original with me, 361 00:42:52.780 --> 00:42:56.680 but the plan of legalization would cut these people off at the knees. 362 00:42:56.680 --> 00:42:59.180 All these people related to drugs. 363 00:42:59.180 --> 00:43:07.180 If the price of drugs was $10 per week supply, none of these vast profits would be earned by anyone. 364 00:43:07.180 --> 00:43:14.180 You wouldn't earn any more profits in drugs than you earn in pens or in chocolate or something like that. 365 00:43:14.180 --> 00:43:20.180 Now, nobody wants to prohibit chocolate. I mean, who are those people that have that sugar disease? What's that called? 366 00:43:20.180 --> 00:43:21.180 Diabetes. 367 00:43:21.180 --> 00:43:27.180 Diabetes. Suppose we prohibited insulin. Now, right now, a diabetic, okay, it's a medical problem. 368 00:43:27.180 --> 00:43:40.180 It's a horrible medical problem. But it's just a medical problem. But suppose we prohibited insulin, thank you, and now the price of insulin, instead of $10 a shot or whatever it is, cheap, was $3,000. 369 00:43:40.180 --> 00:43:51.180 Well, then the insulin people, the diabetics would have to go out and commit crimes, and there'd be vast profits to be made. Now, nobody would advocate a crazy thing like that. Well, it's the same economic principle with drugs. 370 00:43:51.180 --> 00:43:54.180 Then, let's look at a resolution for that. 371 00:43:54.180 --> 00:43:59.180 Diabetes is created because of the foods you eat. 372 00:43:59.180 --> 00:44:03.180 It can be controlled. It can be eradicated. 373 00:44:03.180 --> 00:44:08.180 If you educate and you make available the proper foods for people to eat. 374 00:44:08.180 --> 00:44:15.180 So, why, I mean, why are we going, you know, why are we chasing after the horse after he's gotten out the barn? 375 00:44:15.180 --> 00:44:16.180 Why are we shutting the barn door? 376 00:44:16.180 --> 00:44:19.180 Do you think it would help diabetics if we prohibited insulin? 377 00:44:19.180 --> 00:44:27.180 I'm telling you, it would help diabetics if we would give them what is necessary to keep them from getting sick. 378 00:44:27.180 --> 00:44:34.180 I favor good food and I favor all sorts of medical things to help diabetics, but I don't favor prohibiting insulin. 379 00:44:34.180 --> 00:44:40.180 And you guys, or whoever disagrees with me, I'm not sure who, I think Kimberly is starting to agree with me, I'm not sure. 380 00:44:40.180 --> 00:44:46.180 But you guys are favoring the equivalent of prohibiting insulin, and you're telling me that that's somehow going to help diabetics. 381 00:44:46.180 --> 00:44:47.180 Kimberly? 382 00:44:47.180 --> 00:44:48.180 That is highly problematic. 383 00:44:48.180 --> 00:45:00.180 I think that, and I don't want to get off on the whole diabetic tangent, but I think that we just see the problem in two distinct ways. 384 00:45:00.180 --> 00:45:09.180 We see the problem of drugs differently. And I'm more interested in looking at the systemic causes of drug use. 385 00:45:09.180 --> 00:45:16.180 I'm looking at why would somebody use crack? What is the motivation to use crack? 386 00:45:16.180 --> 00:45:29.180 You don't seem to be that interested in that, but I am interested in that, why that person is doing that, because if there isn't a demand, then the drug dealer on the street makes no money, whether you legalize drugs or not. 387 00:45:29.180 --> 00:45:39.180 So I'm more interested in why people are using drugs, why people are selling drugs, and what we can do to provide options that will make that unnecessary. 388 00:45:39.180 --> 00:45:44.180 You know the story of the blind man and the elephant, you know, one thinks it's like a snake, another one thinks it's like a tree trunk? 389 00:45:44.180 --> 00:45:45.180 Right. 390 00:45:45.180 --> 00:45:49.180 I think you and I are blind men or blind people and there's an elephant out there. 391 00:45:49.180 --> 00:45:57.180 And the elephant is that we really agree. I agree with you that we should try to address the problem of why do people use these horrific drugs in the first place. 392 00:45:57.180 --> 00:46:02.180 But the reason I don't emphasize that is I have no specialization in it. I have no comparative advantage in it. 393 00:46:02.180 --> 00:46:08.180 I leave it to people such as yourself and to doctors and to psychiatrists. I'm an economist. 394 00:46:08.180 --> 00:46:17.180 I have to focus on the economics of it, and the economics of it is that when you drive the price from $10 to $2,000, you reap the whirlwind. 395 00:46:17.180 --> 00:46:28.180 So then you're telling me that you're coming out with this legalization to cut the murder rate down because it's just plain economics to you. That's the only interest you have in this. 396 00:46:28.180 --> 00:46:29.180 Well, it's not the only interest. 397 00:46:29.180 --> 00:46:37.180 That's what it sounds like. But hold up, we got a caller. Thank you for watching and calling our story. Question or comment? 398 00:46:37.180 --> 00:46:40.180 Caller, are you there? 399 00:46:40.180 --> 00:46:42.180 Okay, I'm sorry. 400 00:46:42.180 --> 00:46:45.180 You see, I agree with Kimberly. I support her. 401 00:46:45.180 --> 00:46:49.180 It's just that I have no expertise in that field. 402 00:46:49.180 --> 00:46:54.180 But I certainly support the idea of trying to find out why it is that people find themselves using 403 00:46:54.180 --> 00:46:59.180 whether it's heroin or drugs or liquor or insulin, 404 00:46:59.180 --> 00:47:03.180 and to try to have medical solutions for those problems. 405 00:47:03.180 --> 00:47:09.340 But in addition, we've also got to address this other thing, and there are disproportionately 406 00:47:09.340 --> 00:47:16.640 numbers of black people in jail, they spend decades in jail, for what, for putting crap 407 00:47:16.640 --> 00:47:17.640 into their bodies? 408 00:47:17.640 --> 00:47:18.640 They shouldn't... 409 00:47:18.640 --> 00:47:22.900 Not even for putting crap into their bodies, for possessing the crap that they might have 410 00:47:22.900 --> 00:47:24.260 wanted to put in their bodies. 411 00:47:24.260 --> 00:47:29.620 Right, you see, it's bad enough to put crap in your body or possess it, but why make it 412 00:47:29.620 --> 00:47:36.660 worse by putting him in jail and unleashing these wars. It seems to me, I can't understand 413 00:47:36.660 --> 00:47:43.300 why particularly the black community wouldn't get behind me on this, because it's disproportionately 414 00:47:43.300 --> 00:47:46.660 affecting the black people. Not so much in terms of profits. 415 00:47:46.660 --> 00:47:50.780 Because you're not attacking the problem. That's why they won't get behind it. You're 416 00:47:50.780 --> 00:47:52.140 not addressing the problem. 417 00:47:52.140 --> 00:47:53.140 I am. 418 00:47:53.140 --> 00:48:23.140 I really think that your analogy about the water in the tub is an apt one, because even though we disagree about whether or not that would be true, I really think that unless you address why people are behaving in a particular way, if you remove this one element of their behavior, the negative behavior may continue. If there are no other options, if there's nothing else for you to do... 419 00:48:23.140 --> 00:48:25.140 What's your question or comment? 420 00:48:25.140 --> 00:48:26.140 Oh, it's the side. 421 00:48:26.140 --> 00:48:27.140 How are you doing, Brother Johnson? 422 00:48:27.140 --> 00:48:28.140 I'm fine, thank you. 423 00:48:28.140 --> 00:48:29.140 This is Brother Lewis. 424 00:48:29.140 --> 00:48:30.140 All right, Brother Lewis. 425 00:48:30.140 --> 00:48:41.140 I think it's all conspiracy for the kill the black race of the United States of America. 426 00:48:41.140 --> 00:48:42.140 That's our conspiracy. 427 00:48:42.140 --> 00:48:43.140 Yeah. 428 00:48:43.140 --> 00:48:44.140 That's all it is. 429 00:48:44.140 --> 00:48:45.140 Appreciate it. 430 00:48:45.140 --> 00:48:48.140 Why hasn't a white man been bringing his stuff in here and trying to eliminate us? 431 00:48:48.140 --> 00:48:49.140 Appreciate it. 432 00:48:49.140 --> 00:48:50.140 We're going to get on that. 433 00:48:50.140 --> 00:48:51.140 We're going to talk about it a little bit. 434 00:48:51.140 --> 00:49:04.140 But thank you for calling, and have a good one. Your horse Asah. He's talking about the genocide. The fact that the drugs are used as a weapon to decrease the population of blacks in this country. 435 00:49:04.140 --> 00:49:13.140 He's right. And it's horrible. And I'm trying to stop it, and you people aren't seeing it. I mean, black people are dying like flies over this. I'm trying to stop this. 436 00:49:13.140 --> 00:49:20.140 I don't think that it's that we're not seeing it. I just think that we have some fundamental disagreements with your approach to addressing the problem. 437 00:49:20.140 --> 00:49:43.140 You come from a different community. You come from a different mentality altogether. You come from white privilege, and it doesn't bother you one way or the other, whether they straighten the problem up one way or the other, unless somebody comes and wants to carjack you. Then it's a problem. But besides that, it's not a problem. 438 00:49:43.140 --> 00:50:13.140 Look, I don't think it's a matter of white or black. There are black people that say what I say, Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams, eminent black economists who say exactly what I say on this. And if I'm wrong, it's not because I'm white, it's because my arguments are wrong. So I think that's sort of off the point. But I thought you and I were agreeing, I guess we're not, that we have to try to address the medical problem as best we can, whether it's diabetics and better food, whether it's 439 00:50:13.140 --> 00:50:19.740 Alcohol and, what do you call it, the 12-step programs, Alcoholics Anonymous? 440 00:50:19.740 --> 00:50:24.340 Yes, we have to do that. We agree. Why keep talking about what we agree? 441 00:50:24.340 --> 00:50:28.340 Let's talk about what we disagree on. What we disagree on, I think, maybe, 442 00:50:28.340 --> 00:50:33.940 although I think, you know, you're being inconsistent if you say we should not prohibit alcohol, 443 00:50:33.940 --> 00:50:36.940 but we should prohibit drugs, they're both the same as far as I'm concerned. 444 00:50:36.940 --> 00:50:41.340 No, no, no, no, that's not my position at all. I'm not, I'm not, 445 00:50:41.340 --> 00:50:45.780 Your position, as I understand it, and the reason that we're here, is that 446 00:50:45.780 --> 00:50:48.680 your position is that 447 00:50:48.680 --> 00:50:52.460 if you legalize drugs, the crime rate will go down. 448 00:50:52.460 --> 00:50:56.980 That is where you and I have the fundamental disagreement. Not that 449 00:50:56.980 --> 00:50:59.920 whether or not drugs should or shouldn't be legal, 450 00:50:59.920 --> 00:51:05.380 but whether or not legalizing drugs will result in lower crime, and especially in 451 00:51:05.380 --> 00:51:10.980 decreased murdering. When we legalized alcohol, did the crime rate go down? 452 00:51:10.980 --> 00:51:15.480 I'm sure it did. Well, then why not with drugs? It's the same thing. They're both prisons. 453 00:51:15.480 --> 00:51:23.480 No, I don't think that the motivations were the same. First of all, you had a situation 454 00:51:23.480 --> 00:51:27.420 where something was legal and then it was made illegal, which is different with illegal 455 00:51:27.420 --> 00:51:33.320 drugs. I think that pretty early on with cocaine, crack has always been illegal. 456 00:51:33.320 --> 00:51:40.420 No, no, no. The Harrison Narcotics Act in, I think, 1914 was, by the way, a racist thing 457 00:51:40.420 --> 00:51:47.420 I want to ask Professor, if you legalize drugs and you figure the crime going to stop, what about the poverty that people, you're still going to have crime coming from people that have to eat because the white supremacy has our economics and our community so messed up. What are you going to do about it? 458 00:52:10.420 --> 00:52:17.420 What do you do as far as an economist to bring the opportunities that people will need to sustain their lives? 459 00:52:17.420 --> 00:52:21.420 A lot of guys are dealing drugs sometimes because they don't have food on their table. 460 00:52:21.420 --> 00:52:28.420 You know, I grew up with a young guy who had to borrow salt and eggs and he dealt drugs for that reason because he tried to feed his family. 461 00:52:28.420 --> 00:52:31.420 So, okay, so say your little plan works. 462 00:52:31.420 --> 00:52:36.420 Then what do you do when you have people that are starving in the community? 463 00:52:37.420 --> 00:52:41.960 You can better use some of the economics that you've learned to go and change the conditions 464 00:52:41.960 --> 00:52:46.460 in the community that white America has placed upon the black community. 465 00:52:46.460 --> 00:52:51.800 And at the same time, re-educate the black community who they really are, because a lot 466 00:52:51.800 --> 00:52:54.180 we're running around, we don't know who we are. 467 00:52:54.180 --> 00:52:57.620 We know who you are, we know who Abe Lincoln is, but we don't know who we are. 468 00:52:58.620 --> 00:52:59.620 Well, I'm a... 469 00:52:59.620 --> 00:53:00.620 Thank you, Carla. 470 00:53:00.620 --> 00:53:01.620 We're just about out of time. 471 00:53:01.620 --> 00:53:06.060 But what I want to point out is everyone keeps talking about the same problem. 472 00:53:06.060 --> 00:53:13.060 Whether it's legal or not, it does not remove the problem that blacks have to face and deal with every day. 473 00:53:13.060 --> 00:53:21.060 Well, I want to report to this man. I'm a big fan of Malcolm X. 474 00:53:21.060 --> 00:53:27.060 I once met Malcolm X, and he was one of the most magnetic speakers I've ever met, a magnificent man. 475 00:53:27.060 --> 00:53:32.060 And what he did was, by the way, he was the one that started this Black is Beautiful stuff, 476 00:53:32.060 --> 00:53:35.840 the change a hair color or something like that because black is beautiful and i 477 00:53:35.840 --> 00:53:37.100 think that was wonderful 478 00:53:37.100 --> 00:53:40.060 what he did is he had a whole bunch of shabazz stores 479 00:53:40.060 --> 00:53:42.540 i don't think i have to tell you people about this 480 00:53:42.540 --> 00:53:44.940 but to answer this gentleman's question one of the 481 00:53:44.940 --> 00:53:48.360 ways to get out of poverty is entrepreneurship and that's what malcolm 482 00:53:48.360 --> 00:53:52.180 x was all about and i think that it's a great idea 483 00:53:52.180 --> 00:53:57.580 thank you, Kimberly, we're going to give you the next sixty seconds because we're out of time 484 00:53:57.580 --> 00:53:59.740 i just hope that 485 00:53:59.740 --> 00:54:10.740 The viewers take away from this discussion that we really, really need to focus on the systemic issues in our community if we want to improve our community, not just reduce the crime rate. 486 00:54:10.740 --> 00:54:20.740 If the calls are any indication, they understand that black folk are in trouble either way, whether it's legal or illegal, that we're not addressing the problems. 487 00:54:20.740 --> 00:54:25.740 Professor, I want to thank you for being here and we'll have to get back to this again. 488 00:54:25.740 --> 00:54:49.740 We want to thank everyone that watched us this evening and thank them for calling in and say that these are the kinds of discussions and dialogue that's necessary for us to know and understand what we have to do, what we must do, so that we can be the architects to the solutions that our community needs. 489 00:54:49.740 --> 00:54:53.740 It can't come from without. It has to come from within. 490 00:54:53.740 --> 00:54:56.740 And do we have any more? Got a minute. 491 00:54:56.740 --> 00:54:59.740 Do you want to say anything before we leave? Either one. 492 00:54:59.740 --> 00:55:03.740 Yes, I would like to say that it's a pleasure to be on this show with you every time. 493 00:55:03.740 --> 00:55:04.740 Well, thank you. 494 00:55:04.740 --> 00:55:07.740 I was on once before and I found it exhilarating and intriguing. 495 00:55:07.740 --> 00:55:09.740 And I'm honored that you would have me on your show. 496 00:55:09.740 --> 00:55:14.740 And I hope to come again to talk about this other problem of what to do about black poverty, 497 00:55:14.740 --> 00:55:20.340 which is a very different issue than the people who are dying because of drugs. 498 00:55:20.340 --> 00:55:21.940 We'll do that for you. 499 00:55:21.940 --> 00:55:24.240 And once again we want to thank you for watching, 500 00:55:24.240 --> 00:55:30.240 and we want you to realize and understand that we are here because you are there. 501 00:55:30.240 --> 00:55:39.440 Stay strong, stay black, stay committed, but by all means stay involved. 502 00:55:39.440 --> 00:55:41.440 Jehovah's Witnesses.