THE TRUTH

The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing But the Truth,
So Help you God.

It’s a matter of faith that we all believe that truth in all matters is the best course of action for the righteous as well as the secular. However, as the gray hair keeps gaining an ever-greater share of our mane that adorns our wrinkling domes, we have come to understand that there are times when the truth must be used, shall I say, judicially. Knowing how much of the truth to use in a given situation is one of the more important things that makes us quintessential Human. I am going to provide an example of the truth that will absolutely enrage some people, cause some people to question the premise that is giving rise to this truth, and yet others will try to assimilate this particular truth and become introspective and confused about the matter. Are you ready?
As source material, I am going to make liberal use of the book, Freakonomics, by the celebrated and much respected economics author, Steven D. Levitt, as well as data available from the public domain and available to all. Think back to the early 1990s. Crime was on the accent and the prediction by all of the criminologists, social and political scientists, and other such experts was that law-abiding citizens had better be prepared because by 1995 crime in the good old US of A would overtake us all and make us prisoners in our own homes. However, what happened was quite different. Instead of crime continuing to go up, it began to fall. And the fall was dramatic. By the year 2000, the murder rate had fallen to its lowest level in 50 years. What’s more, the rate of every other sort of crime was also falling in equal amounts. And this just in, the FBI announced that the overall crime rate is still falling as of 2009. So what happened to reverse the crime rate when all conventual’s wisdom indicated that criminal activity would soar like an eagle? Like most Monday morning quarterbacks, the experts scrambled to bring forth logical reasons why this had happened and to spin the data so that their reputations would not suffer. Some of the logical reasons were, the expanding economy in the 1990s, proliferation of gun control laws, the proliferation of right to carry gun laws, progressive policing strategies, more police, cell phones, and on and on. The truth is many of these things had little to do with the falling crime rate. For example, adding more police always reduces crime but any reduction is minuscule at best. Of all of these reasons, cell phone proliferation has probably contributed the most to the apprehension of criminals, not enlightened police work, and the increased apprehension rate will somewhat effect a reduction of criminal activity by removing more criminals from the street. So what really did happen to cause the crime rate to start falling and continue to fall? OK now, get a firm grip on your outrage because the truth in the matter is that Roe v. Wade is what caused the most significant effect on the crime drop. When Norma McCorvey went and got pregnant again, she wanted an abortion because she did not want the child and she could not care for the child. Norma was a poor, uneducated, unskilled, alcoholic, drug-using 21-year-old woman who had already given up two children for adoption, and when she got pregnant again, she wanted an abortion. Problem was that it was 1970 and she lived in Texas and Texas law said it was illegal to have an abortion. The rest is history as Norma McCorvey had her name disguised as Jane Roe as her case went to the Supreme Court and in 1973 the Court held that it is a Constitutional right of a woman to have an abortion upon demand. Mr. Levitt states that decades of studies all indicate when a child is born into an adverse family environment, such as being unwanted and uncared for, that child is the most likely of all to become a criminal. So beginning in 1973, and as a result of abortion on demand, poor, unmarried, drug using, etc. teenage mothers began to have abortions in great numbers. These aborted children, had they instead had been born, would have become part of an ever-increasing pool of unwanted children who, in most likelihood, would have grow up to become potential criminals and contributed to the predicted surging crime wave of the 1990s. Of course, that did not happen. What happened instead was the unwanted children were not brought into the world, and by so doing; the biggest pool of potential criminals was eliminated. So by the time the 1990s rolled around, these aborted children that would be coming into criminal age (late teens) were not here, and as a result, criminal activity has been on the decrease ever since. The unemotional evidence is very strong that this is the truth of the matter. So, know the truth and the truth shall set you free? Well, as for myself, I really don’t know.