Luke Ford

LAS VEGAS (AP) - Two men were arrested in Nevada for investigation of possessing a dangerous biological agent believed to be anthrax, the FBI said today. The suspects include a central Ohio man who was given probation after pleading guilty to illegally obtaining bubonic plague bacteria through the mail. The FBI arrested the men as they were possibly about to test the agent in some way at a medical center in suburban Henderson, Nev.

12:08 PM

By Luke Ford

Prager began the show by chatting with an expert in Washington DC about the danger from biological weapons, and the need for antidotes.

[Prager keeps asking questions before going to a commercial break, then forgetting to ask the question when he comes back. Perhaps he should just ask his questions when it is time to ask them, as well as use fewer words in asking them.]

As today's show progressed, Prager found his fears over biological weapons diminishing.

Dennis Prager compared the administration taking its case for war against Iraq to Ohio State to making the case for abstinence in a whore house. DP says the university houses people who believe that good and evil are subjective terms.

Prager did not respect the chant: "One, two, three, four: We don't want your racist war."

Prager did not respect the administration spokesmen who praised the dissent as what makes America great. DP says that they should've accused those chanting students as racists, as "crypto-Nazis."

What about the American war in Vietnam to keep out communism or its intervention in Central America, and Africa. Dennis called the students "buttocks holes." He compared their morality to the rightists carrying anthrax in Nevada.

"There are few times that I wish that I could be in public life, but this is one of them. I wish that my brain could've been placed in one of the three spokesmen, so I could've called the students crypto-fascists."

Prager finds racism as stupid as it is evil. Race is as important to Prager as hair color. How many white folks look in the mirror and think of themselves as superior by virtue of being white?

Madelyn Allbright, Berger and Cohen argued in legal terms, constantly citing UN resolutions.

DP: "The US is the superpower. We have a moral vision of a better world. We can't depose every dictator, but we can depose the most evil.

"You, at Ohio State, after having taken Poli Sci. 1.2, believe there is no good and evil…but…"

A caller was proud of how the arguments were broadcast around the world. What better example of free speech?

Prager thought the Clinton spokespersons were mediocre. He doubted that it showed the world American freedom.

The caller thought it good to take it to a college campus, as that is the place with people of the age to go to war.

Prager and a caller wondered why Clinton did not go to the public? DP says he is a hidden president because of the Lewinsky scandal. DP called Bill the best salesman in America since Reagen.

Two final callers thought the Clinton Administration set up the protesters. Clinton insisted on CNN being there to cover the occasion.

2-19-98

Dennis Prager spoke about raising good children before 400 Catholics at the Corpus Christi church in Pacific Palisades this evening.

Scheduled for 7:30PM, the Monsignor began the evening around 7:45 with a warm introduction of Dennis, praising his understanding of logic. The Monsignor, who looked about 60, noted that Dennis teaches "sacred scripture" at the University of Judaism.

Prager wore a suit and tie as normal, but no yarmulka (?)

He mounted the podium to thunderous applause and smiled deeply. If we are responsible for our face after 50, then Prager gives off the glow of a kind and good man.

"I am touched by many things. First of all by the Monsignor's introduction. That he takes me this seriously.. it's almost embarrassing. (laughter) I'm flattered that he knew who I was, let alone that I have "implicit presumptions" when I speak. That was a sophisticated introduction. He would not be a good talk show host. (loud laughter) That is meant as a compliment. He used too many fancy words. I have been called in on occassion and told to simplify my vocabulary. I once used three syllables in two sentences.

So when I heard "implicit presumptions," I knew that I had left radio land. And that was a great joy. I'm also honored at the turnout. Normally in Los Angles, if it drizzles, the event is cancelled. (It rained hard prior to his speech)

When synagogues have this many people, the rabbi will often say, "I haven't seen this many since Yom Kippur." I don't know. I have this "implicit presumption" that you do not get this many people for daily mass, though if it is true, I will personally report it to Rome.

It is a joy to speak to you without having to take breaks for a mattress commercial. It is a great joy to give a full blown lecture without having to take call from someone who will tell me how wrong and arrogant I am, or having to break for weather, traffic and news…

I want to read to you the instructions that I was given on what to speak on. [Prager searches about eight different pockets before realizing that he left the sheet in the car.]

Essentially, I was asked to speak on all of life - human nature, growing up in the '90s, happiness, wisdom, raising children, God, religion, happiness… But aside from that I was to feel free… At least there was nothing about cooking, poetry or gardening.

I do not come to this subject on a theoretical basis. I have one child who has moved past her teens, (Anya is 22?), David 15 and Aaron 5. Why my wife and I would want to have another child after surviving a teenager is one of the riddle that one wants to pose to the Lord on Judgement Day.

I remember speaking in the South. A man told me seriously that he believed that when children become teenagers, extraterrestrials take their brains…and don't return them until they turn 20. With all I've heard from professors over the years, that is the single best explanation.

I believe what Dickens wrote. It is the best of times and the worst of times.

If you think that your family has problems, I suggest you pick up the book of Genesis. Adam and Eve have sons, and one murders the other… Few of you have had one son murder the other… So you are already ahead of the first family… genealogically. A number of families in Genesis do not do well. I presume that your kids have not sold one of their siblings into slavery [Joseph].

Prager than introduced his wife Fran, who stood to loud applause.

I told her that she had to come because it wasn't on happiness. Four nights in a row in South America, she had to sit through my lectures on happiness in slow English…

We have different challenges today. My grandparents came from Eastern Europe. My father's parents did not speak English. They spoke Yiddish. They were strangers ethnically, religiously, and linguistically. My father went to public schools. He was essentially raised by Brooklyn New York America.

My grandparents were Orthodox, Yiddish speaking Jews from Eastern Europe and they had no problem with their child attending public school and going to movies. Their values were similar to those of the public school and the movies.

If my father said he was going to the movies, it would never have occurred to his parents to ask, "what is he going to see? Will it corrupt him? Will he go into the streets and see advertisements."

My grandparents had more in common with the society in which their child grew up, than their grandson who is fully Americanized. I, like most of you, are ideologically at war with much of the outer society, in raising my children.

I don't send my children to a public school. I send them to a Jewish Day School. I am not anti public school. I am anti secular school, for there are secular private schools.

I can't let my kids just go to the movies. We don't have the sense today, when the kid says he wants to go to the movies, "oh, that is so beautiful." I can't let them watch any TV. Our Satellite TV broke about seven months ago, and it was a blessing. Now we use our TVs to watch videos.

There is good TV, but there are two problems. Finding it. And the commercials.

I owe my five year old at least one thing - that he get to stay a child. And the society wants to rob him of that. All the news about the scandal in Washington, and the Marv Albert trial. As I said on the air to the ABC correspondent [who said that the news media was simply providing the public with what they want], the news media are prostitutes.

ABC knows that if NBC is first on the air with Marv Albert's sexual predilections, they'll get higher ratings. So ABC has to scoop NBC, and CBS has to scoop them…

So, the news media is not obsessed with what is news, but with ratings.

With much of life, we need to be far more involved with our children than our grandparents with our parents, and our parents with us. I, essentially, after age eleven, raised myself. They let go. They had no choice.

Last year, I talked about a billboard for a certain clothing store in the Melrose area, featuring a Santa Claus with pierced nipples. Doesn't anyone think about the public spirit? To the store's credit, it took the poster down the next day.

It will be on my tombstone: He nipped the pierced nippled Santa billboard.

We parents have to constantly fight society. Everything is against us: The public schools, the media…

What is better today is wealth. Our children don't have to worry about shelter or where their next meal will come from. This comes with its own curse. It is not easy to raise a good person in affluence.

I face this constantly. I ask myself, what do I say no to, when it is obvious that we can afford it. My having a telephone in my room was not an issue when I grew up. If I had asked my dad for one, he would've shipped me off to a psychologist.

We had one bathroom for the family. Now each member has a bathroom. I am waiting for my son to ask, 'Dad, can I have a butler?'

I am lucky that my wife has quit her profession (actress), to make a home.

Human nature is not naturally good. Therefore we have to develop goodness.

I'll never forget the first night of my daily radio show. I was so nervous that I dripped sweat on the microphone. I worried that people would think that I'm broadcasting outside? And I worried that nobody would call. The phone board was blank.

My first show was: Do you believe that people are basically good? It was also the first essay in my book THINK A SECOND TIME.

Babies are sweet and innocent, but they are not good. They constantly demand. They do not think, "mommy and daddy have not made love in four months, therefore I'm going to shut up."

I hear professional educators say, "I've never met a bad kid." Have they met any kids? Kids are rotten. I served as a camp counselor for years. A summer never went by when at least one boy wasn't urinated on… I later served as a director for a camp for adults. And never was an adult urinated on.

I spend my life detoxing the intellectual atmosphere. There is so much nonsense believed. Contrary to the modern belief that we start out beautiful and society corrupts us, we start out disgusting and society makes us better. If you were to drive home tonight and see a building painted with graffiti and smashed windows, would you think that a bunch of senior citizens did it? No, you will assume that kids did it.

To the best of my knowledge, no religion in the world holds that we start out basically good. It is a modern secular belief.

The belief in innate goodness is dangerous for many reasons including: If we start out good, then we don't have to teach goodness. We just have to give our kids love and a good education. But kids given just love and education, will end up loved, educated barbarians.

I remember a caller to my show: She said that if I raise my kid to be good, he won't succeed. As Leo Durocher put it, nice guys finish last. But it is not true. Life is a marathon, not a series of sprints. A good guy may finish last on a test where everyone else cheats, but he won't finish last in life.

Over the past 30 years, we have raised personal feelings to the highest level. We have substituted feelings for morality. We ask "How do you feel about it?"

Many parents say, "I don't want to impose my value system on my child." Then why have a child? Because the world needs another human? Now, you don't ram your value system down the kids' throat. You don't coerce. But you should try to impose your values.

Some parents will say, I won't raise my kid with any religion. He can choose that when he grows up. But then he has never known religion, so how can he choose? You bring them up with religion, than they can choose as adults.

[Parents should be piers that kids push off from.]

I am so grateful that I was taught as a child to read Hebrew. I can read the Torah as easily as I can the LA Times. If I wasn't raised with that, I couldn't do it. It would be too hard to pick up at age 40.

I was taught as a child that humans, not animals, were made in the image of God. That is why you should save a stranger over your dog, if both are drowning.

My son Aaron is in Kindergarten. Last week he blurted out, "You can't eat when you go to the bathroom." It wasn't an admonishment to me.

That was beautiful. He had learned a Jewish law that we should not eat and relieve ourselves at the same time. My child at age five learned that we are not an animal. I get sophisticated graduate school students call me to say, we are just another animal.

But we aren't. We are created in the image of God, as well as the image of animals. Life is a struggle between living as animals vs. living like God…be it eating or sex…

We should give kids objective codes of morality. That there is a right and wrong, no matter how you feel about it.

If you want 36 cookies and the other kids have none, you should share, no matter how you feel about it. Feel all you want, but act good.

I have isolated an issue that is indispensable to happiness and goodness - gratitude. In today's America, however, people believe themselves entitled, simply because they breathe. Ungrateful people are bitter, angry and less kind than the grateful.

We have to teach children to say thank you. Make them realize what has been given them.

It is important for us to model good behavior before our children, but we also have to teach them. A child can't simply watch you play the piano. They need lessons.

The lack of teaching is part of the reason why many decent parents have indecent children. We have to teach character, not just rely on the fact that we are decent.

And everyone has an inflated view of their own decency. Everyone thinks of themselves as good. [Which is why we should judge ourselves on our actions, rather than on our motives. Imagine a video camera is recording how we behave? How would we come across to a disinterested observer?]

I remember when my son invited a friend over. Then later, a friend he liked more called, and my son wanted to cancel the first guest. But we told him that you can't do that. We constantly have to monitor how our kids treat their friends, and each other. We let our kids sometimes treat each other in a way that we would not tolerate if they did it to strangers.

Carmel Icecream decided to find out what kids wish for on their birthday. And it came out that kids who did not have a younger sibling, wanted one. And those who had younger siblings, wanted them to disappear.

I tell my son David, that he must look after Aaron. I tell him it's a Mitzva (commandment). My mom is 78, and she still keeps telling me to call my brother Kenny, a successful lung specialist at Columbia. And she tells the same to him.

Incidentally, this illustrates why I believe that God cares more about how we treat each other, than how we treat God. Just like parents usually care more about how their kids treat each other, than how the kids treat the parent.

Finally, kids need God and religion. They need roots, community, meaning and moral teachings. Even atheists should try to raise their children with God.

When my son David was seven, and I was putting him to bed, he told me that he'd learned at school that day that he had a yetzer hara (impulse to do bad). I was thrilled that he learned that his greatest struggles would be with himself.

It didn't hurt David's self image. He knew that he could conquer himself.

Religious people believe that your greatest struggle is with yourself, while secular people believe that their greatest struggle is with society.

An hour after beginning, Prager concluded his speech to vigorous applause.

The first question came from a young lady who said that her four year had little interest in becoming a good human being. Prager said that was typical. That you have to keep teaching, that is not kind, that is not just, that is not right. That the Bible says…"It's my last resort. If he won't listen to me, I say, 'God says….'"

The second comment came from a man who said he believed that America had died. We lived in a decayed civilization. Prager replied that he was ambivalent whether the American experiment in freedom would continue.

Prager said that he felt particularly concerned as a Jew, as declining civilizations tend to fall apart on the heads of Jews. He mentioned how Germany was the most artistically advanced country in Europe and it unleashed the holocaust.

DP pointed out that American was founded on higher principals than Germany. Prager calls America the only country, in fact (aside from Israel), founded on an idea (human freedom and democracy and the pursuit of happiness).

America has been a democracy for 200 years while the Weimar Republic only lasted ten.

Bad signs: Americans' increasing litigiousness, boasting about cheating on taxes and insurance claims…The lack of stigma attached to single women voluntarily getting pregnant and keeping their children. "We pay you to have babies out of wedlock."

DP worried about the criminal justice system, mentioning the not guilty verdict rendered on OJ Simpson in the criminal trial.

Prager praised Promise Keepers as an example of an organization that will save this country, along with the Boy Scouts.

Prager was challenged on his stance that abortion was not murder. The crowd signalled disapproval with the question (as impolite?). DP replied with familiar arguments. He said that fetuses did not have the self consciousness of born and developed humans, such as those who went through the holocaust, and saw their children murdered before them.

DP's main argument was that he accepted his religion's perspective on abortion. According to Prager, Judaism does not regard abortion as the moral equivalent of murder. (This is a dubious interpretation of Judaism. Many leading rabbis regard abortion as murder, and the unborn as fully human.)

As usual, the men gave long challenging statements while the women asked short, empathic questions.

A woman said that she listened to Prager's show with her son. What should she tell him about the Iraq situation?

Prager wasn't aware of Aaron's interest in Iraq. He asked his wife Fran if Aaron listened to the show. She said that Aaron wanted to turn it off.

Everyone laughed.

Prager said that marriage and children keeps you humble.

He said that one could teach a child, isn't it wonderful that America is fighting the bad guys. He says his son Aaron always wants to know who the bad guys are in cartoons, videos, movies, etc…

A woman asked if it was necessary to send her son to a religious school? Wouldn't it be enough to make a religious home?

Prager said that we should want to surround our children with good values. Our children spend hours a day in school, away from home. Religious school is more likely to inculcate your values than public school. He said that the only down side to religious school was the financial cost.

My youngest son learns at kindergarten how to observe the Sabbath. He learns Hebrew songs that he sings at our table on Friday night…as well as Wednesday afternoon.

Prager was asked for advice for parents helping a teenager choose a college. DP said one should seek to save as much money as possible, as college was generally a rip off. He did not support universal college education. He said many kids should not go to college. They should learn a trade or start their own business.

The final question was a long and tangled one, coming from deep within the man's heart, about how a confused person could find absolutes in life. Prager said they only come from religion.