Bill Clinton: “I think it tells us that we have at least some assumptions about race that still color our thinking, our talking…”

“I think it tells us that we have at least some assumptions about race that still color our thinking, our talking, sometimes our voting. The people in that community, without regard to race, were out there looking for those boys. And most African-Americans in this country get up every day and go to work, work their hearts out, pay their taxes, raise their kids, obey the law. And while the crime rate is higher among African-Americans, they're also more likely to be victims of crime. And it's all really--it's a complicated thing, but it's plainly related to the combined impact of the breakdown of family and community and the loss of economic opportunity working together. I saw a poll in the Wall Street Journal the other day, a fascinating poll, which said that both African-Americans and white Americans agreed that this breakdown of social order in the family, the community, the rise of crime, violence, drugs and gangs and guns was the biggest problem in our country. They agreed with that. They all supported welfare reform--I mean, not all, 85 percent of both races. But there was a huge difference in attitude between blacks and the whites about what caused it, where the whites were more likely to say it's just all personal misconduct, and the blacks were more likely to say it was the breakdown of economic order and opportunity that holds families together and gives people---- Mr. King. The classic American clash.”