It is Walter Williams, and you can be on with us by calling 1-800-282-2882.
And last time I kind of teased the subject for this hour, and I'm going to talk about several things this hour.
And one has to do with this big trans fat hullabaloo.
And New York has already placed limits on the restaurants' use of trans fats, and probably other cities are going to follow.
Now, the American Council on Science and Health, and you can go to their website and read it, and they just point out that there's a lot of panic being created about the effect of trans fats on cardiovascular health.
That means the health of the heart and the secretary system.
And one of the risks is that, well, if you get rid of banned restaurants' use of trans fat, well, what are they going to substitute?
Well, they might substitute some saturated fats, and that will be even more unhealthy than trans fats.
But a more critical issue is what right does the government have in making these edicts to a restaurant?
Maybe the restaurant should maybe say on the menu, maybe, I'm not even sure about this, while we're serving trans fats.
And as I said in the last hour, there's a movement to outlaw the sales of Fra Gras.
And because the way that Fra Gras is produced, they feed ducks or geese or whatever animal they use.
Inordinate amounts of food that makes their liver very fat and unhealthy.
And that's what Fragras is made out of.
And some of the people pushing this, they call it cruelty to animals.
But at the heart, or the maybe stimulus for all these controls, goes back to the movement against smoking and smoking in restaurants and the bogus claims by the EPA about the people dying from secondhand smoke.
Now, how the EPA did this study, the way they did the study, a graduate student writing a PhD, writing a destination, he'd be dismissed from college if he used any of the techniques that the EPA used in reaching its conclusions about the dangerous effects of secondhand smoke.
Now, first of all, I know smoke irritates people, and I know that it stinks.
A lot of people think that it stinks.
But so they should have made their campaign on that, which I doubt whether they would be successful, but they had to tie it to a health issue.
Now, the way the EPA did its study, in most statistical studies, you want a 99% level of confidence.
Well, the EPA tried that, and they didn't get the result that they wanted.
Then they went to 95%, and then to 90%.
And anybody doing a study and doing that, manipulating figures like that, would be deemed as intellectually dishonest.
And matter of fact, for those of you who are interested, you can just check out the British Medical Journal, and it's the largest single study of the connection between passive smoking and mortality.
And it's a 39-year analysis, over 35,000 Californians, and it was published in the British Medical Journal, and it found no connection between passive smoking and mortality.
And I believe the World Health Organization did a similar study, and they reached the same conclusion.
Now, whether cigarette smoke bothers anybody or causes harm to anybody, that is entirely irrelevant to the issue.
That is, it's an issue of private property rights.
That is, maybe if I'm a restaurant owner, if I'm a restaurant owner who wishes smoking in his restaurant, then maybe I put up a sign and I say this restaurant permits smoking and let you decide whether you want to come in under those conditions.
Similarly, a restaurant owner who does not want smoking, you put out a sign, no smoking, and then I decide whether I want to enter the restaurant under those conditions.
Those are the liberty-oriented ways of handling the issue, as opposed to wanting people using the political system to impose, to forcibly impose their preferences on others.
Now, here's a question I haven't had adequately answered.
Let's say that you hate smoking, you own a restaurant, and let's say a bunch of smokers go to the city council and they're able to use their political power to force you to permit smoking in your restaurant.
How would you view that?
You'd probably view it as tyranny.
Well, it works the same way on the other foot.
That is, a guy who wants to permit smoking and people are able to use the political mechanism to force him not to permit smoking.
Well, that's tyranny the same, just the same.
But see, most Americans, and it's sad for me to say this as American with our heritage of liberty, that most Americans feel that it's somehow justified, if they have a majority, to be able to use the political system to impose their preferences on other people.
And I think that that is hostile to the notions of liberty.
Then, see, what happens after that, you establish a template.
And the people who are trying to stop the use of trans fat in restaurants, they are using the template of the anti-smoking campaign.
It worked for the anti-smokers.
Well, why not work for the anti-trans fat people or the people who are against the serving of Fra Gras?
See, once you let the politicians know that they have the right to control your lives, I don't think they're just going to stop at smoking in restaurants, trans fat in restaurants or Fra Gras.
They're going to go further because I have yet to come across a tyrant in history that wakes up one morning and says, I'm tired of tyrannizing people and I'm going to let them go free.
just know of no evidence of that.
So, but you Americans, you believe, you believe that, or many believe that Congress has the right to do anything upon which it can get a majority vote on.
And that's a sad thing.
That is because majority rule or a democracy was offensive to the founders of our nation.
Just read some of the works by John Adams and others feeling how contemptible they were of the idea of a democracy because a democracy is nothing but mob rule or as I believe it was Madison who pointed out, James Madison, that it's just simply the tyranny of the majority.
So anyway, it doesn't look great for the future of our country so long as we Americans are going to allow politicians or allow people to use the political system to run roughshod over us.
Now here's another issue in the news.
It was in the Wall Street Journal today.
And the title of it's called McCain Feingold in the Dock.
And so anyway, the McCain Feingold campaign finance law says that, well, within, it banned certain kinds of political ads in the 30 days before primary and 60 days before a general election.
Now it turned out that the anti-abortion group, they ran television and radio spots.
They were informing the public that certain U.S. senators were filibustering President Bush's judicial nominees.
And they also said that the people in Wisconsin should contact their Democrat senators and congressmen to oppose them to get them to oppose the filibuster.
Anyway, they were taking the court for violation of the McCain-Feingold reform for campaign financing.
Anyway, the Supreme Court, it's likely that the Supreme Court is going to have a chance to review the McCain-Feingold.
I think that the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law, I think it is offensive to the principles of free speech.
That saying that, well, gee, you can't use your money to promote free speech or to promote your ideas.
I think it's offensive.
And I think, I personally think that free speech is something that's absolute.
That is, people have the right to express themselves.
Now, I know some of you are going to call in and say, I know there's some lawyer types out there going to call and say, well, I'm going to save them a call.
Well, you can't shout fire in a crowded theater.
Well, that has nothing to do with free speech.
That has something to do with violation of contracts.
That is, when I go to a movie, I expect to see a movie.
I expect to see a movie.
I paid my way.
I don't expect to see it interrupted.
So that's what somebody hollering fire in a crowded theater would be doing.
He'd be violating my right to a contract that I made with the theater company.
Now, if there's owner Who wishes smoking in his restaurant, then maybe I put up a sign and I say, this restaurant permits smoking and let you decide whether you want to come in under those conditions.
Similarly, a restaurant owner who does not want smoking, he put out a sign, no smoking, and then I decide whether I want to enter the restaurant under those conditions.
Those are the liberty-oriented ways of handling the issue, as opposed to wanting people using the political system to impose, to forcibly impose their preferences on others.
Now, here's a question I haven't had adequately answered.
Let's say that you hate smoking, you own a restaurant, and let's say a bunch of smokers go to the city council.
And they also said that the people in Wisconsin should contact their Democrat senators and congressmen to oppose them to get them to oppose the filibuster.
Anyway, they were taking the court for violation of the McCain-Fine goal reform for campaign financing.
Anyway, the Supreme Court, it's likely that the Supreme Court is going to have a chance to review the McCain-Fine goal.
I think that the McCain-Fine goal campaign finance reform law, I think it is offensive to the principles of free speech.
That saying that, well, gee, you can't use your money to promote free speech or to promote your ideas.
I think it's offensive.
And I think, I personally think that free speech is something that's absolute.
That is, people have the right to express themselves.
Now, I know some of you are going to call in and say, I know there's some lawyer types out there going to call and say, well, I'm going to save them a call.
Well, you can't shout fire in a crowded theater.
Well, that has nothing to do with free speech.
That has something to do with violation of contracts.
That is, when I go to a movie, I expect to see a movie.
You know, I expect to see a movie.
I paid my way.
I don't expect to see it interrupted.
So that's what somebody hollering fire in a crowded theater would be doing.
He'd be violating my right to a contract that I made with the theater company.
Now, if there's on on the on the marquee, when you're getting ready to go into theater, if there's a sign saying during the show, somebody's going to holler fire.
Well, well, that would be okay.
That would be okay because I go in there, I know that somebody's going to holler fire, and maybe the performance will be disrupted.
And a matter of fact, there's some controversy a couple years ago because I said that I think free speech even goes to libel and slander.
That is, I don't think that people should be prosecuted for libel and slander.
And so a lot of people say, well, libel and slander hurts somebody's reputation.
Well, who does your reputation belong to?
Does your reputation belong to you?
No, it doesn't.
That is, what others think of you is not your property.
And so I have the right to say anything I want.
I should have the right.
Of course, the law does not allow me.
We'll be back with your calls after this.
I'm totally in agreement.
Being my age right now, if I had the ability to sell my kidney and make a little bit of money, of course I would love to do that.
But I'm pretty sure that in other countries, organ selling is a big problem on the black market.
And I think it's one thing if you own your car and somebody comes up and steals your car, you lose your car, that's it, and it's gone forever.
Or, you know, or they find it.
But with something like an organ, if you've got that and you're able to sell it, there's a big chance, I think, that you could have an underground black market that opens up and you're walking down the alley, you get taken to the side, and then you lose a kidney, you're getting that thing back.
Well, look, I've heard that kind of criticism before.
And are you saying that if there's a practice and there's a chance of illegal use or illegality, that we should eliminate the practice?
That is, for example, let's say some doctors or let's say some grocery stores, they can sell rotten meat.
Well, just because some grocery will sell rotten meat, does that mean that you have to stop the sales of meat?
No, no.
No, no, that is you prosecute the people who are behaving illegally.
That is, the people who are stealing organs, who are killing people to get organs, you prosecute them.
That is, you don't eliminate something I think is very, very valuable.
No, and I agree.
And that was my other point: to say that I think maybe at this time in the present, we might not be there as far as being able to implement something like that.
But I think maybe in the future, when we can have our DNA and be able to go in and say, I want to give, you know, I want to sell my organ, and they can match that kidney to you and say, okay, this is this person's organ, then you can go ahead and get into something like that.
Oh, absolutely right.
And I think that in the case of somebody who is terminally ill, who's brain dead, and he's in the hospital, then there's not much of a problem there.
That is, there are doctors and their officials there, and you ask the next of kin, can you harvest his organs?
And I think that the next of kin would be far more willing to donate the organs or sell the organs if there was a price for it.
Matter of fact, I was talking to my doctors and internists, and for years he tells me, Walter, you're in perfect health, but you should stop smoking.
And so I asked him, I said, does it make sense to put pink lungs into the ground?
Now, I said, now, if my lungs could become a part of my estate, I would take better care of them.
The optimal way to die is with everything wrong with you.
That is, it's just like the optimal bank account to have when you die is zero.
It's the same thing with your body.
You should die with nothing left.
We'll be back.
The last half hour of the year.
And we're still pushing back.
We're still enthusiastic that we can sell our fellow Americans on Liberty.
You know, one of the issues in the news right now is the minimum wage.
And the Congress is talking about the Democrats saying, well, as soon as they get in, they want to raise the minimum wage from $5.15 an hour.
I don't know, maybe $7 something an hour.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, and the Republicans will probably go along with it.
And for a good reason, I think, which I'll get back to just a second.
Well, the intentions, for the most part, behind support for higher minimum wage, I think, are very good.
That is, people want to see their fellow workers earn a little more money.
But the effects of the minimum wage are harmful for a large segment of workers.
And those workers are low-skilled workers.
And you see the effect of a minimum wage.
If you say, look, no matter whom you hire, you tell an employer, no matter whom you hire, you must pay them $5.15 an hour, plus their mandated fringes.
You have to pay Social Security and you have to pay workmen's compensation, unemployment compensation, things like this.
And a lot of people say that's about a third of the hourly pay.
But let's stick with $5.15 for simplicity.
Okay.
No matter whom you hire, you must pay them $5.15 an hour.
You're an employer now.
So I ask you, if you must pay $5.15 an hour no matter whom you hire, will you hire that worker who is so unfortunate so as to have skills that will only enable him to produce, say, $3 worth of value per hour?
No, you wouldn't.
So the effect of the minimum wage is to discriminate against the employment of the lowest skilled workers.
And there have been a couple, two important surveys by academic economists, and they're reported in the American Economic Review, one in 1979 and 1992.
And 90% of academic economists agreed that increasing the minimum wages cause unemployment among youth and low-skilled workers.
And if you look at the unemployment statistics, you find that the youth unemployment is some multiple of the adult unemployment rate.
And then there's another aspect of the minimum wage law that people don't pay a lot of attention to, or people are just completely ignorant of it.
And that is the minimum wage law contributes or lowers the cost of engaging in racial discrimination by employers.
And a kind of classic case of this was a study I did a number of years ago.
It's called, it's actually turned into a book.
And titled the book is South Africa's War Against Capitalism.
And let me just read, and in South Africa, the major supporters of increases in the minimum wage law, in South Africa they call it, the rate for the job is the same as the minimum wage the major supporters of increases in minimum wage laws were racist unions who would never have a black as a member of their union.
And what was their stated purpose?
Well, let me just read a quote by one of the union officials, and it's uh Gerroti.
He was the secretary of South Africa's Building Workers Union.
Your excellency, it's a great honor to gain your audience uh with you today, and i'm genuicing right now, but this is radio so you can't see it.
Okay, a quick comment before I get to my question is that the next time you sub for Rush, i'd like to hear you debate that goofy Louds about outsourcing and all that other stuff he whines and cries about on his program.
Well, he's beyond the pale, and i'm not.
I'm never going to convince him, but i'm going to try to convince the American people through my uh syndicated columns that he is absolutely wrong.
Well, you can demonstrate to the audience as well okay, yeah.
Well, what i'm really here to uh inquire about is the process by which you were declared the leader of all the white people and who will succeed you in the unfortunate event of your untimely demise?
And I'll hang on.
Well, there's even the question about my demise, and and and probably my daughter.
She will probably be my follower, but anyway, you ask, how did I become the the white leader?
Well, it's kind of a self-appointed position.
Rough rush, he appointed himself as the black leader and so I said, well, I might as well the white leader, and what I've done as the leader of white people.
I have an amnesty and pardon for giving all white people all actually, it's all people of European ancestry for both their own grievances and those of their forebears against my people.
And the reason why I've created this matter of fact, you can go to my website Waltywilliams.com, and click on gifts, and there it is.
And the reason why I did this is because a lot of white people they feel guilty about slavery, and so the reason why I created this amnesty and pardon was so that you stop feeling guilty and stop acting like damn fools.
That is, you know, a lot of white people will accept behavior of blacks from blacks that they wouldn't begin to accept from whites, and a lot and and the reason is that they feel guilty.
And so anyway, I became the white leader because I wanted to, you know, provide leadership, because white people need leadership as well.
And yeah, and matter of fact, one interesting thing about this leadership business, I've asked myself, you know, when people talk about black leaders, I say, who's the Chinese leader?
Who's the Irish leader?
I couldn't come up with names.
Who's the Armenian leader?
I couldn't come up with any names.
And so I say, what kind of assumptions must one make about blacks?
To say that we alone need leaders?
And I find those assumptions, as a black man, somewhat embarrassing.
But however, getting back to your question, how did I become the white leader?
I appointed myself and I think many white people are happy that I'm leading them and we'll be back with your calls after this university that is more conservative in nature.
Well actually, I have a colleague who's done a lot of research and I've relied on a lot of his search.
His name is Professor Dan Klein, and you can go to his website, and he's done a number of studies in conjunction with another colleague and I can't think of the colleague's name.
She's, I think, from Sweden pointing out the, the open bias and the lack of intellectual or ideological diversity on college campuses and he shows that at many college campuses, up to 90% of the professors in some departments, in some cases 100% of the professors in some department they, according to surveys that he's done, they vote Democratic,
they and so and so the so at.
So the thrust, the thrust of the college campuses is left-wing professors who use their classes to indoctrinate, they use their classes to proselytize students, which I think is academic dishonesty.
I've been teaching for 37 years, and I would challenge anyone to find any previous student of mine who can say that I taught something in class other than microeconomics.
That is, I think that to the kind of opinions I express on the Rush Show and in my syndicated columns, they're never expressed in class because these are my opinions and it is academic dishonesty to try to sell students or to use your opinions in class.
And now a student might ask me about something I wrote in a column and I'll say, well, see me after class or come during my office hours because that's not the topic of discussion.
And so I try to be academically honest, but I'm afraid that most of my colleagues, not necessarily, in our economics department, we probably have the only totally free market economics department in the world.
And we have very distinguished.
We have two Nobel laureates on our faculty, as well as a number of up-and-coming young scholars.
And we have probably the only totally free market department in the world.