Home

2-18-98

Dennis Prager on KABC Radio, AM 790, Los Angeles.

By Luke Ford

Prager says that he is proud to be American. He feels good about the way the US, virtually alone in the world, seeks to take on Saddam Hussein.

When people point out Europe is not with us, and with the death penalty, that shows to me its moral bankruptcy.

A caller pointed out that if Hitler and Germany had been bombed when it first violated WWI treaties in the 1930s, there would have been no WWII.

A caller pointed out that Germany retried the man who knifed Monica Selles was retried and placed in a psychiatric institution.

The caller said countries do not act on a moral basis, but rather in their own self interest.

Prager says that he supports the arming of Iraq against Iran in the 1980s. He compared it to supporting Hitler against Stalin. At that time, Iran sought to transport fundamentalist revolution.

Next caller said DP was "a moral lighthouse," to quote Dr. Stephen Covey.

Prager says that Americans vote for the happier, nicer guy (Clinton and Reagen). He says that the Republicans have become wimps.

DP says Al Gore believes that the greatest challenge facing humanity is not evil, but the greenhouse effect.

A caller claimed that what stopped the first US v. Iraq, was that Hussein threatened to unleash nuclear weapons.

DP doubted that the caller knew something that the world media had missed.

Dennis agreed with a later caller that part of the reason for the lack of international support for the American fight against Saddam, is the low credibility Clinton has. DP also agreed that Clinton has cut the military budget too much, and that we may not be prepared for this fight.

DP says that he probably restrains himself too much from criticizing Clinton and he apologized to his listeners for not alerting them enough to Clinton's military cutbacks.

At 1:40 PM, Prager interviewed social psychologist Roy Baumeister who wrote a book on evil. Prager told him that he knows of six books written on goodness, and 50,000 on evil.

The psychologist was fascinated how 'normal' people can do evil. He said many have written about what made Hitler so evil, including his relation to his penis. What interested the shrink was how ordinary people supported Hitler.

To order the book, call 1-800-288-2131 EVIL: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty.

DP: Can we call people evil?

Shrink: Yes, but they do not see themselves as evil. It is [an artificial] category into which we put people.

Prager disagreed.

The shrink said we could certainly categorize actions as evil, but he was not comfortable with classifying people as evil.

DP remarked how every caller to his question "Are you basically good?" Everyone says yes.

Roy gave four reasons for why people do evil.

#1 IDEALISM. The shrink says that people do lots of evil in the pursuit of something good - communism for example. Many said it represented something they learned in Sunday School.

Timothy McVeigh and those who bomb abortion clinics.

#2… Means to an end - money, power, sex… Instead of working hard, they do evil.

#3 Shrink denied that low self esteem causes violence. He says that many people who do evil have inflated views of themselves, and often become violent when these inflated views of themselves are challenged.

Prager wanted to hug the psychologist. He noted the Oliners, who wrote a book on Altruism and Holocaust rescuers, said there was no relation between rescuing and self esteem.

Shrink agreed. He said he'd studied self-esteem for years but found no relationship with decency. He wished that it did, as it would provide work for his profession.

Rather, he found narcissism a component of obnoxious people.

#4 A smaller reason. Some people can learn to get pleasure from hurting others.

DP: You think that is learned?

[I agree with DP's skepticism. Look at how kids enjoy inflicting cruelty.]

The shrink took a call about the substitution of psychological categories for moral ones. Instead of calling evil evil, we call it sick. Roy blamed his profession.

DP: What you say is contrary to your profession?

Prof: I get lots of positive responses from my peers.

Prof said he does not see EVIL as a property of the protagonist, but rather it is a label applied by victims and bystanders.

Prof said he did not see the word EVIL as objective, as it is a linguistic term, it must have some level of subjectivity. Roy said most cultures through most of history have agreed that certain things are evil - such as killing an innocent neighbor.

Prager remembered a nervous women in Colorado who in an introduction to Dennis, stumbling through her prepared notes, said Dennis "was preoccupied with doing evil."

Coming back from a commercial, Prager called KABC "the center of intellectual life in Los Angeles."

DP says that a review in the Washington Times alerted him to the book.

I, Luke Ford, called in at 2:28PM: "I recall an FBI study which found that the most distinguishing characteristic among murderers was love of pornography. What role does porn play in triggering evil?"

Roy: "Not much."

Luke: "What about violence in the media?"

Roy: "It might stimulate a few, and over time, desensitize many of us."

Prager called the notion that porn causes violence a big lie of the Right.

[Between 2:30-2:44, I was lathering up and rinsing off in the shower. So what happened?]

A woman, Tina, called up at 2:44, to push the case for porn causing violence. She thought it degraded women. The prof destroyed her argument, so she tried to rephrase it.

She said women don't like porn.

DP: So what?

If porn caused violence, said DP, then gay porn would cause gay men who watched it, to commit violence, which the woman couldn't answer.

Prof said that self control was the biggest thing that kept people from doing evil. Roy said to forget the self esteem movement and replace it with self control. It makes you a better employee, husband, neighbor, friend… and it helps you better achieve your own goals.

DP: "I'm falling in love."

DP: Are bad people more or less happy?

ROY: Less happy. Grumpy obnoxiousness is a stable trait, and such folks are not happy.

On the E-mail list which discusses Dennis Prager, Rhonda wrote:

Luke, your recaps of Dennis's programs are interesting, but almost every day, you get some kind of a jab in at Dennis. Usually it's very petty. Yes, he's a passionate centrist. Centrist does not imply dead and passionate is the key word here. The baby Richard debacle was an outrage. Once again the courts put the feelings of an adult above the needs of a child and probably ruined the child's life. And this is standard procedure in our Ameircan courtrooms.

Dennis' passionate feelings and words were very appropriate.

If you have a criticism of Dennis, you should call him and tell him to his face instead of using this forum to constantly pick at him. His screener doesn't weed out people that disagree with him. In fact, he usually puts people who have a disagreement ahead of the others. If the screeners aren't letting you on, maybe they feel that your criticisms are so petty that they wouldn't be of interest to anyone or would put everyone to sleep.

I think what bothers me about your criticism of Dennis is that they aren't just honest disagreements about what he says. You pick apart the way he says things, trying to trip him up, pointing out even the most mild (what you perceive to be) inconsistencies and blowing them out of proportion. Maybe in your quest to improve the world, it would be more effective if you took that microscope of yours off of Dennis and turned your attention to that man in the mirror for a while.

...You are an excentric, obsessive psychopath. If Dennis were a woman, he could have you arrested for stalking.

2-20 Mike Dang:

At first blush of this series [by Luke] of posts I thought "How petty." But as I read further I came to appreciate Luke's pursuit of restitution of his newslist image. I haven't seen his site, I haven't actually read the individual posts referred to. Snowboarding called me away for a week. So I don't know about the slander. But I like to see a person pursue proper restitution and it seems like Luke's doing so appropriately. I also have to respect Chris's nutting it up in terms of membership. Since my roommate's membership in a local synagogue costs him $800 a year (and he says that's inexpensive) I can appreciate what Chris is willing to put up.

This whole thing is pretty entertaining. Like must see TV. I hope Rhonda will likewise nut it up if she's guilty as charged.

Sarcasm aside, all I know is I've immensely appreciated Luke's daily recaps. I can't listen to Dennis most of the time so his recaps really help.

Errors of material public facts about Dennis by Luke should be easy to point out. I assume they have been by David. But to sling so many outrageous swords and arrows at Luke seems excessive. Sounds like sour grapes to me, Mr. Uva.

"Ungrateful"? What the heck is that. Is DP "His benevolency"? DP is a man like many. Yes, like many. DP's the one that regularly talks about his sexual fixations. DPs just a regular dude that happens to distinguish himself by thinking with impressive singularity and clarity.

DP thinks better than most, and not as good as some, not unlike other modern day sharp thinkers, like Frankl, Herzberg, Nozick, etc. Let's not begin worshipping him just yet.

Chris Donald:

I have no problem with the 'recaps' for the most part. They usually to do more good than harm.

If Luke is willing to abandon ship on the unauthorized Bio and Web Page, as he said he would after DP asks him to do so, I will largely agree with you.

But not until then. Descency demands that.

It has been one issue - the world wide publishing of an unwanted (by DP and co.), unauthorized, and factually fractured "biography" with a running commentary by a writer criticizing a moral and scholarly figure beyond his league. That is the only significant area where we part ways, at least publically.

Luke is one of those rarities where you have enormous talent buried beneath a dung-heap of poor decision making, coupled with an inability to process moral criticism of his activities as anything other than Persecution. Even when it comes from numerous and responsible directions.

He has moments of genuine sweetness and clarity, but they soon lose all luster, sanded down by the impish, adolescent recklessness he bestowes onto others' (and his own) dignity.

Alan:

I have been critical of Luke in a previous post for a lack of journalistic ethics and what frankly seems to be a psychopathic approach to dealing with DP and his retainers. However, you have also crossed a line here. This is still the US of A and we have the First Amendment. DP has gone to considerable lengths to make himself a public person. It is Lukes choice to publish or not; neither you or DP or any one else has a say in that. He has a moral responsibility to be accurate. Dennis and company have a right not to be stalked. We all have a right not to read what we don't want to read.

Mike Dang:

If DP asks Luke to abandon ship as you mention then I would hope Luke would comply if only out of respect for DP. While I support Luke's free speech right to publish regardless of DP's request, and while I support a person wishing to pursue proper restitution, I firmly believe fans of DP should share DP's general respect for others as well as DP's other general values. That sharing of values such as respect should extend to complying to a request from DP. Certainly that would shed the brightest light to indicate where Luke stands.

CHRIS:

I hold that writing an unwanted book about someone's private life is Gossip.

THAT is immoral in my religion, of which Luke is a member. I never said he didn't have any legal standing. Like the right to shed unwanted babies into a sink until the last moment, he has the legal right to publish whatever comes into his head- with few legal conditions. He is not morally allowed to.

Gossip is a close kin to murder in the Torah. Spreading it is a large sin. We have a belief that you can murder a man's character- even in reporting the truth as you see it. If it is unwanted, you don't publish it if it is private-even if the person revealed it to someone else in another public forum. DP has the right to not want what he's said spread further than it is now. His private life is not completely yours to peruse -morally- just because Luke wants to compile from various, often obscure, sources- including but not limited to personal memory.

I wouldn't accuse you of being immoral were the BIO yours. I would accuse you of ingratitude, and try to morally suade you, as I am Luke. I just wouldn't have as firm a footing with you, as I have no idea what God or code of ethics you follow. I know where Luke gets his rules...and he's not justifiable witin them at all. Not in my opinion, and not in the opinion of any Rabbi I can imagine.

Claiming innocence because "My profession is a higher calling than doing as God asks me (not to spread gossip)" does not exempt you from moral judgements.

A Jew is to carry God into every endevour. And I couldn't see God writing this book, Alan.

In a message dated 2/22/98 5:46:12 AM, Luke wrote:

>Such a media rep would not last in >the real world. I have dealt with media reps since about age 14, and have dealt with hundreds.

CHRIS DONALD:

Funny..... she [Laurie Zimmet] makes about 4 x YOUR income (Luke the Professional Journalist), and seems to be doing reasonably well. DP's career is *still* flourishing- even as a religious mole in the secular media. She is responsible in LARGE MEASURE for much of the content of each show.

Perhaps all those Pulizer Prize winning articles and near bestsellers that you've written -while dealing with all those More-Professional Media Reps" - just needed more......advertising or something...

I recommend you leave her out of your criticisms from now on. You don't match-up real favorably. (She doesn't even write, and she's managed to publish just as many books as you have.)