The religious right has long rebelled against abortion for many reasons. One of their concerns is the "domino effect". This theory contends that if one approves of abortion in the first trimester, then all sorts of other ethical issues will rush through that open door. If one endorses abortion, what will be next? The list is long: euthanasia, stem cell research, genetic engineering, and even cloning.

While I have long been critical of the religious right, I am slowly beginning to understand their concerns about this "domino effect". The light went on and shone brightly with the recent comments by Bill Bennett about aborting blacks. This gad-fly of the Republican right, created a moral maelstrom with his comment about curing crime with abortion. Bennett said, "I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down."

In response to this politically incorrect statement, many Americans took issue with Bennett's comments. Even the White House responded to this in a nanosecond-days faster than their response to Katrina.

I, for one, don't want to deal with the racial issues surrounding Bennett's statement. I'm more concerned with the implications of his comment beyond racism. Bennett's Moses-like political Passover of killing all black babies and sparing white babies allowed me to see what the Pro-Lifers have been concerned about ever since Roe v. Wade. If you view a first trimester abortion as morally acceptable, you then open the door for racial abortions to reduce the crime rate.

Do you see where this will lead us? If Bennett's notion goes unchallenged, who will be next? I'm holding my breath hoping that some black leader won't suggest aborting all white babies thus avoiding all white-collar criminals like Ken Lay, Martha Stewart, Dennis Kozlowski, and Bernard Ebbers. This would also eliminate possible political crooks Tom Delay and Bill Frist. I can see Jesse Jackson weighing in on this one. He'd have a point; I don't know of any blacks convicted of white-collar crime. Perhaps, we should call these merely white crimes.

Some liberals wail against Bennett for seeing race as the reason for crime when poverty is the major factor and not skin pigment. However, if you theorize about cutting down black crime by abortion, then the next logical step would be aborting whites so as to reduce white crime. It won't be long before we wind up eliminating nearly all males whether black or white.

Then Bennett and company would extend the program by aborting female fetuses. The argument would be that by aborting females, we would cut down on dangerous drivers most of whom are clearly women-young or old. This would also eliminate women working outside the home. God knows that women should stay at home where they belong.

Having solved crime, working women, reckless driving, gays and lesbians would be next. Clearly, one can see the benefit to aborting gays. It would avoid the entire problem that straights have with gays in our society. If there weren't any homosexuals around, we solve the gay marriage controversy. In addition, it will allow guys to be guys again without having someone suggesting that they need to be more sensitive and more in tune with good taste and fashion. Macho men would be able to return to their original place in society without the fear of a queer eye looking askance at them for a fashion faux pax.

Having taken care of those issues, then they would abort all remaining Irish babies. This would eliminate most of the alcoholism in the world. A side benefit to aborting the Irish would be that St. Patrick's Day could return to being a religious feast day and not a time for unabashed drunkenness.

Next, Bennett's minions would address terrorism by aborting all Muslims and/or Arabs. Just to be on the safe side, they would go after everyone who didn't look American.

If we were to allow Bennett's notion of resolving black crime by aborting all black males, where will this logic lead us? It would solve another global problem-over-population. There is a downside to this idea though. I fear that I will be lonely and won't have many readers of my column. Hmmmmm? I think that Bill Bennett needs to rethink abortion as a social therapy.