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That the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) finally delivered a decision returning and restoring power to the states on this one issue, abortion, is as it should be. If her state outlaws abortion; a woman can still board a Greyhound bus to get the procedure elsewhere.

The ethical elegance of the libertarian argument has been reiterated before in this space:

“Women have the right to screw and scrape out their insides to their heart’s content.”

Trojans, Trivora or a termination: An Americans woman has the right to purchase contraception, abortifacients and abortions, provided … she pays for them. For like herself, America is packed with many other sovereign individuals. Some of these individuals do not approve of the products and procedures mentioned. Americans who oppose contraception, abortifacients and abortion must be similarly respected in their rights of self-ownership.

Taxpayers who oppose these products and procedures ought to have an equal right to dispense of what is theirs—their property—in accordance with the dictates of their conscience. America’s adult women may terminate their pregnancies (to the exclusion of late-term infanticide).

What America’s manifestly silly sex does not have the right to do is to rope other, presumably free Americans into supplying them with or paying for their reproductive choices. The rights of self-ownership and freedom of conscience apply to all Americans.

Late-term abortion, generally, must always be outlawed (I realize I owe you argument, yet have provided only assertion. My apologies; you’ll have to wait). One could argue that, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the deciding case brought before the SCOTUS, did concern late-term abortion, with the state of Mississippi banning abortion after 15 weeks:

The Jackson clinic and one of its doctors sued Mississippi officials in federal court, saying the state’s law was unconstitutional.
A federal district court and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the clinic, blocking Mississippi’s law. But the state appealed to the Supreme Court, which put the case on its docket.

Call it real federalism—on this one vexing issue—although, any reluctant state taxpayers will still be on the hook for such services. And , federalism has hardly been revived. Powers have never been more concentrated in the Federal Frankenstein, which has never been more intractable and tyrannical.

Have we not just lived through three years in which the Pharma State has consolidated power as never before? On pain of taking the Covid jab, the state has de facto established license to shutter a subject’s business, deny him freedom of movement, quarantine, fire, and separate him from loved ones. Sorry: Abortion does not rate a mention on a serious country’s scale of priorities.

Law is force. Outlawing abortion, in the midst of a true crime wave, and a systemic breakdown in ordered liberty, implies the creation of a new category of criminal, consisting of the abortion seeking “spiteful mutants” and their healthcare aids, to be jailed for the commission of an abortion.

Another pesky detail: However much one disdains abortion, one can’t get away from self-ownership. You have no right to take custody of another’s body. A woman, however loathsome, either owns herself and everything in her or doesn’t. You can’t “own” yourself in conjunction with other busybodies.

The piss-poor quality of the now-overturned Roe V. Wade jurisprudence has never been in question. Wrote a perspicacious reader: “There were 50 state laws on abortion until the Republican-appointed Harry Blackmun decided to merge the musings of his Mayo Clinic physician buddies and the vaguely written 14th Amendment into a stream-of-consciousness halachic decision known as Roe v. Wade. Since then, 55% of black pregnancies get aborted compared to a third of Hispanics and 11% of white.”

These statistics are significant in the context of crime. John J. Donohue and Steven D. Levitt (2001) had established that “the legalization of abortion, in the early 1970s, played an important role in the crime drop of the 1990s.” Ceteris paribus, “legalized abortion will account for persistent declines of 1% a year in crime over the next two decades.”

Reversal of the trend is inevitable.

Myself, I don’t have sticky fingers and have no desire to control another’s uterus. Let progressive women—especially the fulminating fiends rioting across the country—suction their wombs for all I care. As evolutionary psychologist Ed Dutton has suggested, “Some people voluntarily resigning from the gene pool is a good thing.”

The consequences of similar efforts against family planning in the undeveloped world have been described less daintily by Kevin Myers, an Irish columnist who was banished from the ossified, idiotic media:

The wide-eyed boy-child we saved, 20 years or so ago, is now a low IQ, AK 47-bearing moron, siring children whenever the whim takes him, and blaming the world because he is uneducated, poor and left behind. … Somalia [is] another fine land of violent, AK 47-toting, khat-chewing, girl-circumcising, permanently tumescent layabouts, and housing pirates of the ocean. Indeed [in Africa], we now have almost an entire continent of sexually hyperactive, illiterate indigents, with tens of millions of people who only survive because of help from the outside world …

American Woman: A reminder to conservatives who want these medusas to be mamas: Babies begotten by such hos will likely be a lot like their feral mothers, who are NOT in God’s image. These gorgons are howling at the gods for being so in-and-out ugly. A medal to the man who gets on top of such putrid flesh for his jollies. Women who behave worse than primates in estrus are not mother material.

Dallas women TWERKING for abortions. WTF

“Shakin dat a** so we can kill our babies, proud to be a hoe and not to be a ladies” pic.twitter.com/tyTCEbDXhr

— ELIJAH SCHAFFER (@ElijahSchaffer) June 25, 2022

FRED REED: Musket And The Noodle Stall: A Strategic Comparison

America, Asia, China, Economy, FRED REED, Military, Trade

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BY FRED REED

In big-chunk terms, in the world today we see a contest between the Chinese economy and the American military, between Chinese dynamism and American coercion. Sure, China has a military and the US has an economy. Yet the emphasis, and spirit are as described.

The United States gives priority to the military over civilian economy, with military spending increasing at the expense of internal infrastructure and social needs. By contrast, China focuses on infrastructure within and trade without. I wonder whether Americans are aware of the extent of this. And its likely consequences.

To read the Asian-based press—Asia Times, Nikkei Asia, the South China Morning Post, the Global Times, and various tech sites—is to see a constant stream of infrastructure projects in China and advancing trade outside. As perhaps many know China promotes the Belt and Road Initiative, a massive program to connect all of Eurasia, as well as Africa and Latin America in a huge trade zone connected by rail, highways, fiber optics, maritime links, and commercial treaties. If completed it will dwarf the United States.

China, a rising technological center, leads the world in civil engineering, manufacturing, Five G, trade, and clearly intends to maintain the lead. All power ultimately rests on economic power. Below a few news stories more or less randomly chosen from around the web. Can you think of American equivalents?

China Mandalay Rail Line

“New international railway route from Southwest China’s Chongqing Municipality to Mandalay, southern Myanmar, has officially started operation, with the first freight train departing from Chongqing on Monday, which will arrive in Mandalay about 20 days earlier than what it takes on traditional routes.”The port will also further connectivity under the Belt and Road Initiative and increase Chinese influence in Myanmar. Key word: Trade.

America leads in phenomenally expensive aircraft carriers with serious developmental problems and no particular purpose. Google “Ford class carriers.”

“China’s high-speed rail network hit the 40,000-kilometer mark by the end of 2021, reaching out to 93 percent of domestic cities with a population of over 500,000, An Lusheng, deputy head of National Railway Administration, said on Friday. This comes as the country ramps up a push to build itself into a transportation power.”

Fast, pervasive transportation greatly facilitates almost everything. Beijing has said it will have 30,000 miles in a few years. key words: manufacturing, trade, connectivity.

“The first China-Russia highway bridge, which stretches from Heihe, a border city in Northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province, to the Russian city of Blagoveshchensk spanning the Heilongjiang River, opened to traffic on Friday, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported. It will open a new international highway that will boost the connectivity between cities in China and Russia.“ A few days ago. Here we have more of China’s program to tie all of Eurasia into one interconnected web. Note that it says the “first” bridge. Key words: Trade, connectivity.

China plans new high-volume space-launch facility

“The new Ningbo spaceport, the nation’s fifth such facility, will give a crucial lift to Beijing’s new space programs as its rivalry with the United States reaches space. The spaceport is said to be tailor-made for Chinese commercial aerospace manufacturers and service providers to one day wrest business and foreign orders from US rivals.”

Typical China. Planning five years in advance. If this follows the country’s pattern, construction will begin and continue without interruption until completed. Keyword: Commercial.

America leads world in overpriced fighter aircraft with history of unending engineering problems. Google “F-35.”

“Cargo carried via New Land-Sea Corridor in western China grows 38% in Jan-May”

“With the RCEP coming into effect, the corridor has played a bigger role in boosting trade between China and ASEAN. On April 8, four trains left Southwest China’s Sichuan Province, carrying aluminum products, agricultural equipment, industrial equipment, chemicals and food to Laos, Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia

The RCEP, Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, is a vast commercial agreement among whose members are all of ASEAN, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and China.”

Key word: Trade.

Multi-functional modular seabed trencher developed by a Chinese firm has recently completed 100 kilometers of pipelines construction in “Bangladesh’s first marine pipeline project, setting two world records in directional drilling and deep trenching.”

My knowledge of pipeline trenching would be zero even after three cups of coffee and a hearty breakfast. I note, though that it is in Bangladesh: More connection of China and everywhere else. It also sounds like good engineering. Key words: Trade, connectivity.

“The CKU Railways will create significant trade opportunities for Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan while linking China directly to the Middle East via Rail, with spin off benefits throughout the region.”

China, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan will be tied more into the Central Asian ecosystem. Construction begins next year. Key words: Trade, connectivity.

America is unchallenged in funny-looking Batplane intercontinental nuclear bomber costing, says Aviation Week, $640 million a copy as America prepares to fill intense world demand for nuclear war. Google “B-21.”

The China-Laos Railway: Yunnan to Vientiane by Bullet Train

Written by Coco Yang Updated Feb. 11, 2022

On December 3rd 2021, the 1,035-km (643-mile) China-Laos Railway was fully opened making possible a bullet train journey of only 10 hours from Kunming to Vientiane, capital of Laos. Key word: Trade.

China-Europe freight train trips top 50,000, yearly growth of 55% from 2016 to 2021

“The value of goods transported by the cargo service skyrocketed to $74.9 billion in 2021, up from $8 billion dollars in 2016, and its share in total trade between China and Europe has increased from 1.5 to 8 percent, according to the release China State Railway Group sent to the Global Times.” America will probably try to block this traffic because it goes through Russia. Again, coercion over competition. Key word: Trade, connectivity.

Proposed US military budget: $857 billion. Keywords: Profits, stupidity.

China Hosts over Sixty Percent of World’s Five G Base Stations

“China had set up a total of nearly 1.43 million 5G base stations as of the end of 2021….”

And many more this year. As can be found by browsing tech sites, China leads in Five G patents, installed base, technology, and manufacturing capacity. Keywords: Trade, manufacturing.

Many millions of Americans can’t read, a hundred thousand a year die of opioid overdoses, the economy is a trainwreck, and despair grows, but the Pentagon has Space Command to give America “Total Spectrum Dominance,” which presumably will pay our mortgages.

China’s digital yuan extends usage into finance scenarios

“SHANGHAI, June 17 (Reuters) – China’s digital yuan can now be used to buy wealth management products, pay for insurance policies, and extend bank loans, as the central bank further expands e-CNY’s application beyond retail shopping, though still only in pilot schemes.”

China is the world’s leading major country in digital currency. Beijing is low-key about it but implications for global finance worry the US. Keywords: Money, connectivity.

US leads world in pricey, unnecessary but glamorous and profitable nuclear-missile submarines. Google “Columbia class submarines.”

China moves toward STEM leadership

Worth reading. “American” prowess in technology increasingly rests on East Asian and Indian scientists and engineers as the US destroys its schools to further inclusiveness. Keywords: Abject, stupidity.

“Value of China-Vietnam Cross-border Freight Trains More Than Triples in Q1”

US has both largest military budget and largest number of citizens living on sidewalks.

China leader in supercomputers: “As of June 2021, 188 of the world’s 500 most powerful supercomputers were located in China, a figure which is a third more than that of its nearest competitor, the United States, which accounted for an additional 122 supercomputers. Together, the two nations account for around 60 percent of the world’s most powerful supercomputers.”

This needs to be read with caution. How the two stack up in aggregate computing power, whatever that means, I don’t know. The US just announced the first exascale computer at Oak Ridge. The Sunway Oceanlight from China is on many websites said to be exascale, but isn’t quite. The important point is that it is entirely of Chinese design from architecture to chips, using silicon of Chinese design and manufacture. It is remarkable that China can manage this in the face of American attempts to strangle the country technologically.

China Launches World’s Largest container Ship

A gorgeous monster. Check photo. China also has seven of the world’s largest cargo ports. Keyword: Trade

Trade deficit with China. Boring but worth a glance.

“During 2021, the United States exported $151,065,200,000 in products to China, but then imported $506,366,900,000 in products from China, resulting in $657,432,100,000 in total trade between the two countries–and a $355,301,700,000 deficit for the United States.”

Keyword: Can you guess?

Read Fred’s Books! Or else. We know where you sleep.

******************************************

FRED REED describes himself as [previously] a “Washington police reporter, former Washington editor for Harper’s and staff writer for Soldier of Fortune magazine, Marine combat vet from Viet Nam, and former long-haul hitchhiker, part-time sociopath, who once lived in Arlington, Virginia, across the Potomac River from the Yankee Capital.”
His essays “on the collapse of America” Mr. Reed calls “wildly funny, sometimes wacky, always provocative.”
“Fred is the Hunter Thompson of the right,” seconds Thomas E. Ricks in Foreign Policy magazine. His commentary is “well-written, pungent political incorrectness mixed with smart military commentary and libertarian impulses, topped off with a splash of Third World sunshine and tequila.”

FRED’S BOOKS ARE ON AMAZON, HERE

FRED’S ARTICLES ARCHIVE

Killer Kink

Hardboiled is back! (The exclamation point is to arouse wild enthusiasm int the reader, a boiling literary lust.) Gritty crime fiction by longtime police reporter for the Washington Times, who knows the police from nine years of riding with them. Guaranteed free of white wine and cheese, sensitivity, or social justice.

Lousy Lithuania Blockading Kaliningrad Could Be A Catalyst For World War Three

EU, Europe, Foreign Policy, Russia, The West, War

2 Replies

Russia will have to intrude into NATO territory to feed its people in Kaliningrad. NATO, doing Uncle Sam’s bidding, could then invoke its Article 5 obligation to, one and all, galvanize against Russia.

On July 28, 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia pursuant to the killing of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife by a Serbian nationalist in Sarajevo, thus effectively starting the First World War.

Americans, aside some asses who may rot in Russian jails as prisoners of war, have not gotten as worked up about Ukraine as the neoconservative, neoliberal and the ConOink laptop bombardiers have wanted them to.

But Lithuania’s partial blockade of Kaliningrad—“a Russian sovereign territory on the Baltic Sea, sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland,” and thus reliant on these EU neighbors, also NATO members, for overland shipping of essential supplies—might just constitute a provocation like the one that ignited WWI.

This is the case because Russia will have to intrude into NATO territory to feed its people in Kaliningrad. NATO members, doing Uncle Sam’s bidding, could then invoke their Article 5 obligation to, one and all, galvanize against Russia.

Via ZeroHedge:

Ahead of the new Lithuanian transit ban taking effect, the state railways service was reportedly awaiting final word from the European Commission on enforcing it:

The cargo unit of Lithuania’s state railways service set out details of the ban in a letter to clients following “clarification” from the European Commission on the mechanism for applying the sanctions.

Previously, Lithuanian Deputy Foreign Minister Mantas Adomenas said the ministry was waiting for “clarification from the European Commission on applying European sanctions to Kaliningrad cargo transit.”

Brussels then ruled that “sanctioned goods and cargo should still be prohibited even if they travel from one part of Russia to another but through EU territory,” according to Rueters/Rferl.

In Moscow’s eyes, this is tantamount to laying economic siege to part of Russia’s sovereign territory and one million of its citizens. When the EU first proposed the blockage of goods as part of the last major sanctions package in early April, Kremlin officials warned of war given Moscow would have to “break the blockade” for the sake if its citizens.

MORE.