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Ever since the first baby was successfully born of in vitro fertilization in 1978, reproductive technologies have been hailed as a positive innovation designed to address the infertility issues plaguing modern society. What started as experimental solutions for couples who had difficulty conceiving naturally, however, has rapidly turned into a multibillion-dollar global industry that monetizes reproduction for all with little care for bioethics.

Donating eggs or sperm, becoming a surrogate, or serially creating embryos are all scientific marvels, but they take a gamble on the meaning and responsibilities of reproduction, deprive children of humanity, and infringe on natural rights. At a time when being child-free is praised, it is worth celebrating that men and women crave the joys of parenthood. Whats not celebratory are practices that deprive children of parents in very unhelpful ways.

As noted by Them Before Us founder and Federalist contributor Katy Faust on a recent episode of The Federalist Radio Hour, third-party reproduction sacrifices childrens rights and replaces them with the selfish ambition of adults. That driving ideology, Faust said, is present in both abortion, the baby-taking industry, and the baby-making industry that is big fertility.

Both of them determine a childs rights based on whether or not they are wanted. In abortion, if a child is unwanted, you can violate their right to life and force them out of existence. In big fertility, if a child is very wanted, you can violate their right to their mother and father and force them into existence. But in both of these places, the adults are determining whether or not a child is worthy of protection of their rights simply based on what adults want, Faust said. Children are not commodities. They are not objects of rights. They are subjects of rights. Children have rights, and because they are the smallest and most vulnerable among us, they especially need special protection.

In one recent dystopian example of this breach of natural rights, Israel started allowing families, often wannabe grandparents, of fallen soldiers to request sperm be posthumously extracted and used to create children. Oftentimes, Bloomberg reports, Hundreds of women volunteer to help conceive and carry the child in a display of national solidarity and what seems to be a growing preference for a sperm donor who isnt anonymous and whose family will be involved.

The bizarre trend of planned orphanhood is ripe for bioethics criticism and surely wades into uncharted legal territory but is still largely supported by the nations legislative body, which voted in March to allow the practice to continue as long as soldiers agree to it before they enter the service.

Similar situations have already crept into the United States. In 2019, the parents of West Point Cadet Peter Zhu, who died in a skiing accident, petitioned a judge for permission to harvest their sons sperm. The mourning parents overlooked criticisms that welcoming a child from a dead father is not ethical in favor of preserving some piece of our child that might live on.

Speaking of male gametes, approximately 30,000 to 60,000 children who were conceived with donated sperm are born every year in the U.S. A Harvard medical school study found that of the 143 sperm donor children who were surveyed, 62.2 percent felt the exchange of money for donor gametes was wrong. An even higher number, 74 percent, said they often or very often think about the nature of their conception.

Individuals experienced significant distress upon learning about the nature of their conception, the study noted.

Whether children of sperm donors care how they were conceived, they can still run into a myriad of problems such as accidental inbreeding, especially if they are the product of a serial sperm donor.

Without regard for the harms that come with outsourcing reproduction, aspiring grandparents, celebrities, single women looking to fulfill motherly instincts without committing to a long-term relationship or marriage, gay couples, and anyone who wants to avoid the symptoms and bodily changesrequired of carrying a baby have essentially unfettered access to the buying and selling of pregnancy, as long as they can afford it.

Not only does the fertility industry support practices that sideline kids, but they also sustain practices that teeter on the edge of eugenics.

For example, one same-sex couple in California decided to sue an IVF clinic that wrongly implanted a female embryo in their surrogate, who later birthed a healthy baby girl. The men claimed in their lawsuit that they had always wanted a boy and explicitly notified the fertility center that they wanted only male embryos transferred.

Many fertility processes also rely on creating a multitude of embryos and then grading and discarding those that are not deemed suitable, even though those low quality embryos can yield successful pregnancies. Embryos that have met the subjective standards but are not wanted at the moment are frozen and stored possibly to be used, as Bravos Andy Cohen, an unmarried gay man, recently suggested, decades later by family members including the embryos biological siblings.

You know what Im thinking this is crazy but if either of [my kids] cannot have kids, maybe in 20 years theylldefrost their sibling and raise them. Is that a weird thought? Cohen asked.

A Today Show article tried to reassure Cohen that no according to theNational Embryo Donation Center, embryo donation (either for research purposes or to people who desire children) is an option for those who are finished having children. The increasing push from corporate media and elites to normalize such an inherently odd and potentially morally objectionable practice is alarming.

While young men and women in America are committing to sterilization in protest of the U.S. Supreme Courts Dobbs v. Jackson decision, others are selling their bodies and gametes to an industry with little regulation, oversight, regard for childrens rights, or understanding of the benefits of traditional marriage and family.

Reproductive technologies have been around for decades, but as their effects play out in society, ethical issues have already surfaced and will continue to do so. Just because science and technology mean we can do something doesnt mean we should.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

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It's Time To Evaluate The Ethics Of Reproductive Technologies - The Federalist

In his latest bid to amass greater control of Canadian society, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is set to move forward with his governments plan to reduce nitrogen emissions by limiting fertilizer use among Canadian farmers.

The revelation came following a Friday meeting between Trudeau and Canadian provincial ministers, where the prime minister unexpectedly announced his decision to cap fertilizer emissions by unilaterally targeting the countrys agricultural sector.

Fertilizer emissions reduction was not even a topic on the agenda of the annual meeting of Federal-Provincial-Territorial ministers of agriculture, a joint Alberta-Saskatchewan government press release reads. Provinces pushed the federal government to discuss this important topic, but were disappointed to learn that the target is already set. The commitment to future consultations are only to determine how to meet the target that Prime Minister Trudeau and Minister Bibeau have already unilaterally imposed on this industry, not to consult on what is achievable or attainable.

As referenced in the press release, the targets set by the federal government include a bid to reduce absolute levels of [greenhouse gas] emissions arising from fertilizer application by 30% below 2020 levels by 2030, which the Trudeau administration previously announced in December 2020. While Trudeau has not publicly released specific mandates, the provincial governments of Alberta and Saskatchewan are blasting the prime minister for advancing the policy.

Were really concerned with this arbitrary goal, said Saskatchewan Minister of Agriculture David Marit. The Trudeau government has apparently moved on from their attack on the oil and gas industry and set their sights on Saskatchewan farmers.

Alberta Minister of Agriculture Nate Hornerechoed similar sentiments, saying that [t]he world is looking for Canada to increase production and be a solution to global food shortages and that the Federal government needs to display that they understand this.

We cannot feed the growing world population with a reduction in fertilizer, the two governments added.

Although the Canadian government has previously implied that it wishes to reach the 30 percent reduction target while not compromising crop yields, such a policy prescription would seemingly do just that. According to a 2021 analysis by Fertilizer Canada, Trudeaus short-sighted approach to reducing emissions will result in the need to reduce nitrogen fertilizer use and will have considerable impact on Canadian farmers incomes and livelihoods.

It is estimated that a 30% absolute emission reduction for a farmer with 1000 acres of canola and 1000 acres of wheat, stands to have their profit reduced by approximately $38,000 $40,500/annually, the report estimates. In 2020, Western Canadian farmers planted approximately 20.8 million acres of canola. Using these values, cumulatively farm revenues from canola could be reduced by $396M $441M on an annual basis. Wheat fa[r]mers could experience a reduction of $400M.

Trudeaus brazen targeting of farmers isnt the first time the Canadian prime minister has attempted to utilize government force against everyday workers. Earlier this year, Trudeau employed the Emergencies Act to go after Canadian truckers protesting the federal governments Covid vaccine mandate on the industry and went on to smear the protesters as extremists.

Today in the House, Members of Parliament unanimously condemned the antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Black racism, homophobia, and transphobia that weve seen on display in Ottawa over the past number of days, hesaidin reference to the protesters. Together, lets keep working to make Canada more inclusive.

The crusade against farmers by power-hungry governments is also not exclusive to Canada. In the Netherlands, government officials have similarly implemented a series of measures to curb fertilizer use in the name of climate change. Such policies have been met with significant pushback by Dutch farmers, who have been engaged in nationwide protests for the past several weeks.

Shawn Fleetwood is an intern at The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He also serves as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood

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Canada Is Waging A Climate-Crazed War On Farmers - The Federalist

Last week, Michigans Democrat Gov. Gretchen Whitmer vetoed funding for maternity homes, adoption tax credits, and other budget items that assist pregnant women. While post-Dobbs, Whitmer and her fellow Democrats seek to conceal the partys pro-abortion agenda by pushing state courts to institute the extreme abortion regime they demand, in striking from the budget any spending that has a semblance of supporting the choice of life, Whitmer exposes her partys abortion-first position.

When the Supreme Court overturned Roe and Casey and held in Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization that there is no federal constitutional right to abortion, the high court stressed that it was returning the authority to regulate abortion to the people and their elected representatives. While Republican legislators took heed of the high courts directive proposing, debating, and compromising on bills regulating abortion, Democrats instead flocked to state courts with the hope that activist judges would supplant the will of the people by using their raw judicial power to find a right to abortion in the state constitutiona tactic the pro-abortion left began decades ago in anticipation of the Supreme Court reversing Roe and Casey.

This approach provides Democrats cover to hide behind soundbites such as health care and medical decisions without staking a public position on specific abortion regulations. Kansas provides a veritable case study of how Democrat lawmakers seek refuge behind the battlement constructed by that states Supreme Court out of its 150-plus-year-old constitution.

In 2019, in Hodes and Nauser v. Schmidt, in response to a lawsuit brought by two abortion providers challenging a state law that criminalized dismemberment abortionsin which live fetuses are killed by being ripped apart limb by limbthe Kansas Supreme Court declared for the first time that the states constitution provides a fundamental right to abortion. While several Democrats voted in favor of the ban on second-trimester D&E, or dilation and evacuation, abortions that were at issue in Hodes, when the Kansas legislature voted to amend the state constitution to overturn Hodes and to put the Value Them Both constitutional amendment on the ballot for the citizens of the state to decide, not one Democrat voted in favor of the amendment.

That Kansass supposedly pro-life Democrat lawmakers voted against returning the authority to make laws to regulate abortion to the legislative branch makes no sense, unless they faced demands from the national party to oppose the Value Them Both Amendment. After all, the passage of the Value Them Both Amendment does not institute any specific abortion regulation. All it does is allow the bicameral state legislature to pass such bills as the peoples elected representatives deem appropriate.

While opposition to the proposed constitutional amendment in Kansas by the handful of ostensibly pro-life Democrats is either illogical, hypocritical, or cowardly, the Democrat Partys position makes eminent sense once one realizes abortion extremism is the partys mainstream. And post-Dobbs, the only way to hide that reality from the public and enshrine in the law an abortion regime overwhelmingly opposed by the majority of Americans is to make state court justices do the dirty work.

With a vote on Kansass Value Them Both Amendment scheduled for just over two weeks away, on Aug. 2, Democrats talking points confirm that strategy. The constitutional amendment on the Kansas ballot will mandate government control over our private medical decisions and pave the way for a total ban on abortion with no exception for rape, incest or to save the mothers life, PBS reported Ashley All, a spokeswoman for Kansans for Constitutional Freedom, complaining. Im grieving for all the pregnant people who cant access care, Dr. Iman Alsaden, the medical director for Planned Parenthood Great Plains, added in an interview with PBS.

The Kansas amendment, however, merely clarifies that there is no state constitutional right to abortion. And while the abortion lobby highlights the possibility that a future Kansas legislature may prohibit abortions, even in cases of rape, incest, or where a mothers life is at risk, they ignore the reality that under Hodes interpretation of the states constitution, Kansass Supreme Court has dictated an extreme leftist regime of abortion on demand at any stage of pregnancy, for any reason and with taxpayer funding, and with no waiting periods or parental notification. Democrats will have achieved that end without needing to publicly support or vote for such laws, and in turn, will avoid the backlash from voters who believe the state has gone too far.

Conversely, should the constitutional amendment pass, to become law, abortion legislation in Kansas will need to obtain the support of a majority of members of both the House and the Senate, and possibly a super-majority in the event the Democrat governor vetoes the bill. The legislators will be forced to discuss and debate the bill and put their names and their political future behind the righteousness of the proposed abortion regulation. Every election, thereafter, the peoples representatives must face voters and answer for their positions, and if the populace disagrees with the law or finds it too extreme, the remedy lies in the ballot box.

Democrats do not want the people to decide abortion policy, however, because they know the populace does not support their partys extreme abortion-on-demand position, which is why in Kansas, abortion activists pretend a complete abortion ban is on the ballot. Likewise, in Michigan, rather than debate abortion policy and push for legislation to implement the publics preferences, Whitmer has instead turned to the state Supreme Court to institute an extreme abortion regime through the Michigan constitution, while she and her fellow Democrats sidestep debates over limits on abortions.

In fact, in announcing that she had asked the Michigan Supreme Court to expedite her lawsuit seeking a declaration of a state constitutional right to abortion, Whitmer used nearly identical language to that spoken from the abortion lobby in Kansas. While politicians in other states rush to ban abortion, even in instances of rape or incest, Michigan must remain a place where a womans ability to make her own medical decisions with her trusted health care provider is respected, Whitmer said in a press release.

What Whitmer wont tell the public, though, and what she and her fellow Democrats dont want Michiganders to know, is that they want an abortion regime that permits abortion on demand for any reason until the moment of birth, paid for by taxpayers. And that is precisely what will be installed on the populace if the Michigan Supreme Court finds a right to abortion in the state constitution. Further, by using the Michigan Supreme Court to achieve this end, rather than the legislative process, Democrats can avoid the extremist label.

But while Whitmers rhetoric and her use of the judicial system to achieve her ends may mask Democrats intent, her line-item vetoes in last weeks 2022-2023 budget make clear where the party stands on abortion, even if she prefers the courts provide the bottom line: It is not about choice or helping women; it is about abortion first.

Whitmers stark strike-out from the budget of funds designed to help women choose life or to aid women who have chosen life says it all. The budget items she struck went much beyond assistance to pregnancy resource centers, which since Dobbs have strangely been in Democrats crosshairs. Whitmer actually struck $4 million allocated for maternity homes that provide safe housing and comprehensive support services without charge for pregnant women who are without a safe home and in need.

Whitmers line-item vetoes likewise exposed the revolting truth that Democrats prefer abortion to adoption. Here, the Democrat governor struck $2 million in tax credits to adoptive parents and $10 million designed to provide factual information to pregnant women about adoption as an alternative to abortion, including the birth mothers ability to establish a pre-birth plan.

No amount of political posturing can overcome the reality seen in the black lines Whitmer used to cross out care for women and their children. And hide as they might behind activist judges, that budget tells the world Whitmer and her fellow Democrats dont value women, or choice, or health care. They value abortion.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist's senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prizethe law schools highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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Pro-Abortion Whitmer Slashed Maternity Care From State Budget - The Federalist

Surrounding the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade, activists have unleashed a wave of attacks against more than 100 pro-life pregnancy centers, churches, and nonprofit groups nationwide.

Now, as Kansas voters head to the polls on Aug. 2 to vote on a pro-life amendment to their state constitution, that bitterness and disruption have reached even usually peaceful parts of the country.

Over the past month, Joel Richardson, who lives in Overland Park near Kansas City with his wife and five children, has said hes had nine Vote Yes signs vandalized or stolen from his front yard.

This is the first time Ive ever put up any political yard sign since living in Kansas for the past five years, he said in a phone interview. With an issue this important, theres power in publicly making a stand. It shows your neighbors who have a similar mindset that theyre not alone.

Recent news reports and social posts confirm that at least dozens of Vote Yes signs have been destroyed, spray-painted, or stolen. We have always respected the First Amendment and peaceful protests, said Mackenzie Haddix, spokeswoman for Value Them Both Coalition, in a statement. Unfortunately,our supporters have experienced aggressive actions from opponents of the amendment who are clearly misinformed about what this will mean for Kansas.

In the suburbs of Johnson County, part of the growing Kansas City metro area, Richardson tweeted on June 26 as he put up a Vote Yes sign.Vandals soon struck.

But he had two sources to get more signs as needed: local adoption agency Zoes House and Trinity House, a nearby Catholic bookstore. Im a son of the Reformation, said Richardson, an itinerant minister and author. But I absolutely celebrate the Roman Catholic Church and their faithful members strong stance in defense of justice for the innocent.

When the first sign was stolen, the second and third were reinforced with rebar rods and packing tape. And by signs four and five, Richardson and his family were keeping closer watch.

I covered a few signs with lithium grease to make them super slippery, he said. They had to work hard to get them off. but they still removed those. Most often, they would just stomp on it to destroy it.

Richardsons frustration grew at this pattern of crime. I could easily affix razor blades to a yard sign. But then if they came into my yard, tried to steal my sign, and got hurt, they could sue me. So the homeowner is really in many ways at a loss.

Last week, he caught the latest act of vandalism on video.

On July 17, he posted that video on neighborhood-based social platform Nextdoor. I was very polite about it, he said of his post. It stated in part: If the girls look familiar, maybe at least talk to them. The good news is the elections will be over soon.

The post generated a few dozen comments, most from apparent adults who endorsed the property damage. One Nextdoor neighbor wrote: Good on them. Theyre standing up for their rights. Human rights should always be more important than property rights.

However, within 72 hours, Richardson said, a moderator emailed him about taking down the video. Nextdoor staff removed your content because we determined that it was a violation of our Community Guidelines, an email provided by Richardson read. Nextdoor is not a place to publicly shame your neighbors. However, he noticed comments in support of the vandalism remained.

Despite pushback, Richardson said he saw the humor in the drama and wasnt trying to hurt or be cruel to anyone. As intense and emotional as this issue is, I still am a big believer in having fun with it. Lets all lighten up a little bit. By this time, his 11-year-old was in on the escapade.

In addition to the tags, now Richardson needed to coat the sign with something stronger than grease. He hit on glue traps used to catch spiders. I went on Amazon and found you can get big rolls of this rat trap glue for cheap.

In the dead of night, a neighbor took the bait.

Richardsons iPhone tracking the tags led him to a house less than a mile away. He parked and his iPhone began to beep as he approached a car in the driveaway. The trunk was ajar, with metal rods sticking out. Soon he could tell he wasnt the only victim of theft.

Richardson, exasperated after weeks of vandalism, called the cops. When local police officers knocked at the alleged vandals door, Richardson said, the 22-year-old young man, clearly upset, knelt down and placed his hands on his head. Richardson asked the officer about working out a neighborly arrangement rather than pressing charges.

Richardson approached the young man and his grandfather. Listen, I dont care if you disagree with my political stance, he said. Millions of people have died for our right to the freedom of speech, our freedom of opinion, and our right to vote. You dont come into someones yard and try to take that. Thats not right.

The alleged vandal was apologetic, according to Richardson, and the two had a short dialogue about the issues. Richardson also wanted to know if the rat trap glue he used really worked.I put that stuff all over the signs, he said. The young man that stole the two signs, he said it was very effective and actually ruined his clothes.

As the vote on Aug. 2 nears, further disruptions are expected. Haddix said Value Them Both will continue to represent the pro-life cause through peaceful and persistent calls to Kansans to value both women and babies.

For Richardson, his Value Them Both yard sign stands again. Some would question why he didnt insist the rule of law be enforced. Was that apology realwith officers standing nearby?

Sure, its frustrating to have multiple people steal my property, said Richardson. But I didnt want to contribute to a cascading snowball of polarization and hatred in our country. Instead, we had a face-to-face conversation where he heard my heart, and I learned a little bit of his story.

The minister added: The Bible says, Mercy triumphs over judgment. And I hope that little human interaction will impact him more than if I just pressed charges.

With five abortion-related state ballot initiatives to be decided this year, the summer of rage could extend into fall in several states. Richardson views the pro-life cause as rooted in ethics.

In the hierarchy of ethical issues, nothing takes greater precedence than wholesale slaughter of the most innocent little lambs the universe has to offer.

Josh Shepherd covers culture, faith, and public policy for several media outlets including The Stream. His articles have appeared in Christianity Today, Religion & Politics, Faithfully Magazine, Religion News Service, and Providence Magazine. A graduate of the University of Colorado, he previously worked on staff at The Heritage Foundation and Focus on the Family. Josh and his wife live in the Washington, D.C. area with their two children.

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The MacGyver Guide To Protecting Your Pro-Life Yard Signs - The Federalist

The House Select Committee on Jan. 6 hired another television producer last month to elevate the drama of its summer show trials which concluded Thursday. Season two will debut in September.

In June, the committee hired Dan Przygoda, an Emmy-nominated news producer whose rsum includes stints at Bloomberg, ABC News Nightline, and Good Morning America, to help stage the theatrics for the panels series of televised hearings.

Can now announce that Im working with the [Jan. 6 Committee] on their upcoming hearings, Przygoda tweeted in an announcement on June 20.

Przygoda joined former ABC News President James Goldston to assist in the televised production, after Goldstons hiring was reported in early June. The committee had already held three out of eight of its summer hearings by the time Przygoda announced his role.

The committees employment of television news producers to dramatize its proceedings showcases how the partisan probe has approached its work of persecuting political opponents in a public forum absent a legitimate defense. The panels series of summer hearings possesses all the hallmarks of the Soviet-era show trials in the 1930s where regime dissidents were dragged before the public courts and declared guilty without fair representation.

In March, Democrats on the committee conceded the panels work was all about smearing the political opposition ahead of the November midterms.

Jan. 6 committee faces a thorny challenge: Persuading the public to care, headlined The Washington Post in a story that chronicled staffers anxieties over making a three-hour riot which happened more than 18 months ago interesting to the broader public.

Their challenge: Making the public care deeply and read hundreds of pages more about an event that happened more than a year ago, and that many Americans feel they already understand, the Post reported, followed by the passage below (emphasis added):

Theyll attempt to do so this spring through public hearings, along with a potential interim report and a final report that will be published ahead of the November midterms with thefindings likely a key part of the Democrats midterm strategy. They hope their recommendations to prevent another insurrection will be adopted, but also that their work will repel voters from Republicans who they say helped propel the attack.

Staging the hearings as must-see televised events became a central pillar of the committees strategy to gin up interest. Przygoda spent Thursday nights show trial previewing what was to come in the proceedings on Twitter.

After seven two-hour-plus hearings failed to offer panel members their knock-out blow, Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney opened the committees eighth hearing with the announcement of a second season in September, just before the election.

We have far more evidence to share with the American people and more to gather, Cheney said.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com.

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J6 Committee Hires Another TV Producer To Dramatize Show Trials - The Federalist

The New York Times on Thursday ran a slew of pieces by its full-time columnists wherein they purported to offer a confession of sorts about something each of them had gotten wrong in the past.

Each headline began, I was wrong about, when they should have more accurately begun, Its safe now to profess that I was dishonest about this thing because its no longer a factor in my political pursuits.

Michelle Goldbergs column,I was wrong about Al Franken, is about how she regrets having called for the shunning and resignation of the former senator, who was credibly and accurately accused of sexual assault, an allegation replete with photographic evidence, multiple witnesses, and an apology from Franken himself. Goldberg writes that today she believes it was wrong of her to call for him to lose his job without first there being a Senate investigation.

What she really means is that Franken was sacrificed so that Democrats and liberals could further use the so-often-absurd #MeToo movement as a political weapon against their opponents, but unfortunately it backfired.

Gail Collins piece, headlined, I was wrong about Mitt Romney (and his dog), is her apology for so gleefully mocking and attacking the Republican senator when he ran for president in 2012. What she really means is now that Romney attacks the head of his own party, hes good.

But the most awe-inspiring of the whole series is Bret Stephens, the former Wall Street Journal writer who identifies as a conservative despite calling for Republicans to lose every election of the past decade. His column, I was wrong about Trump voters, is hysterical in its blatant dishonesty wrapped up nicely in a shocking degree of self-regard.

When I looked at Trump, I saw a bigoted blowhard making one ignorant argument after another, he wrote. What Trumps supporters saw was a candidate whose entire being was a proudly raised middle finger at a self-satisfied elite that had produced a failing status quo. I was blind to this.

Stephens went on to use the opportunity to brag about how nice his life is. I belonged to a social class that my friend Peggy Noonan called the protected,' he said. My family lived in a safe and pleasant neighborhood. Our kids went to an excellent public school. I was well paid, fully insured, insulated against lifes harsh edges. Trumps appeal, according to Noonan, was largely to people she called the unprotected.'

Definitely sounds like a man with his tail between his legs.

Nobody buys for a second that Stephens is in any way genuinely reflecting on his contempt for the people who dared support Trump. (He literally says in the piece that he believed Trumps voters were moral ignoramuses.) I can promise you this is not something he would have written had Trump won reelection in 2020.

Stephens even admits it. Would I be wrong to lambaste Trumps current supporters, he says, the ones who want him back in the White House despite his refusal to accept his electoral defeat and the historic outrage of Jan. 6? Morally speaking, no.

What Stephens is really trying to say is that its one thing for him to tell you that its too bad youre not doing as well as he is, after hes fought in every way to keep it that way. Its another for him to do anything that would actually have changed that.

But in the same spirit of that Times series, I have my own confession: There was a period when I believed journalists in the national media were honest and decent people who were imperfect but always trying. I was wrong about all of that.

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I Was Wrong About The Media. They've Always Been Showy Losers - The Federalist

The Choco Taco is muerto. May it rest in peace. We didnt deserve it.

Once upon a time, we were a nation of visionaries and dreamers, a people who blasted beyond boundaries and invited those of every tribe and tongue to enter the American rocketship and use their talents to conquer the universe with us. Together, we carved interstates through mountains, built skyscrapers, and slipped the surly bonds of earth. There was no place we couldnt go, no limit we couldnt surpass, and most of all, nothing we couldnt turn into dessert.

We turned cartoon characters and professional wrestlers into frozen sweets. We turned weapons of mass destruction into popsicles. But most impressively, we turned tacos into ice cream.

The Choco Taco was the example par excellence of Melting Pot Americas commercialized culinary hubris. In 1983, Good Humor debuted its recently departed delicacy. And while Mexican cuisine may loom large in American food culture today, its important to remember this was not the case at the time.

In 1983, Taco Bell had a mere 1,600 locations nationwide, compared to over 7,600 today. Most Americans had never heard of Taco Tuesday, never seen an avocado, and couldnt tell their barbacoa from their carnitas. And yet, despite our limited familiarity with the referent, Good Humor had the audacity to fill their ice cream trucks with a parody confection.

You know that food you barely remember from the one time your grandmother took you to a Chi-Chis in Trenton, Good Humor said to us. Heres a joke ice cream version of that. We bet youll eat it.

And eat it, we did. For countless 80s babies, for those of us raised on boiled meatloaf, wet-paper-flavored apples, and the other haute cuisine of the day, we embraced the Choco Taco before we embraced actual tacos. Gripping the waffle shell in our summer-sweat-covered hands, we eagerly consumed a delicacy we didnt fully comprehend. And when we did, an inclusive curiosity sparked within us.

To the white kids of Reagans America, the Choco Taco declared, Theres a world of real tacos out there. Go discover it. Go embrace the people who gave it to you! Accept those whose culinary culture offered you something far more delicious than baloney and ketchup sandwiches! Befriend them!

Likewise, for the non-white kids of America, the Choco Taco declared, You belong. You matter. Dont be offended that we yoinked your culture and turned it into diabetes snacks. Thats an initiation ritual here. Thats how Business America shows you that we (sort of) accept you (kind of).

But then we won the Cold War, we became complacent, and we lost the desire to expand our horizons. By repeatedly giving the Weird Al treatment to exotic new delicacies, we could have conquered xenophobia and added glorious new flavors and textures to the American melting pot. We could have invented the Banana Split Baozi or the Lotta Chocolatty Chakalaka. Instead, we got sloppy and lazy.

We lost the desire to better ourselves, to discover how we might use technology to slather mid-tier ice cream upon previously unslatherable surfaces. We settled for artless tech, declaring, Hey, youve heard of ice cream, but have you ever heard of smaller ice cream? So we freeze-dried it and called it Dippin Dots. We cut it into chocolate-covered microcubes and called it Dibs. We made ice cream stale. We made it boring. And we called it progress.

Likewise, as Marxism wormed its way through our elite institutions and corrupted our collective mind, we paralyzed ourselves by demonizing culinary curiosity with our constant shrieks about cultural appropriation.

When people close down burrito food trucks because the owners are insufficiently Latinx, we have ceased to be a people capable of expanding the frontiers of Frozen Dairyland. When white Americans arent allowed to embrace and borrow the sweetest bits of other ethnicities, the reach of those ethnicities is hindered, and you get what we have now: a thousand artisanal creameries selling $25 kale and rose hip sundaes to bitter thirty-somethings, but not a single ice cream truck selling FroYo Falafels to curious 5-year-olds.

Rest in peace, Choco Taco. You taught us wonder and acceptance when you gave us nuts and chocolate instead of tomatoes and cheese, but we abandoned you. You should have lived a thousand years as the abuelo to a United Nations of modestly delicious novelty ice cream offshoots. Instead, youll be buried alone because well be too busy canceling Otterpops for normalizing transphobia.

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This Woke World Didn't Deserve The Choco Taco - The Federalist

It is no secret that there is a legitimate demographic crisis in most of the Western world. Birth rates in America and most of Europe have declined well below the level needed to replace the population. There are plenty of religious, patriotic, economic, and social reasons for Americans to be deeply concerned about this trend. This has caused an interesting willingness among conservatives to embrace heterodox policy ideas that traditional libertarian economic thinkers find abhorrent. One now finds conservatives calling for Republicans to get serious about the governments family and public health policy, as well as Republicans such as Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Marco Rubio of Florida being the insistent voices for increased child tax credits.

There is an inherent tension here. On one hand, conservatives are suspicious of any increase in government spending or interference in the lives of citizens, rightly believing that most charity is best distributed at the local level by families, churches, charitable organizations, etc. On the other hand, we are staring at a civilizational crisis where people are not having enough children to sustain the population. This has serious consequences for our ability to function as a stable society with a thriving, healthy economy.

Conservatives will have to continue this dialogue about how to enact pro-family economic policies that encourage stronger, larger families without unnecessary government intrusion into family life. Child tax credits created through the tax code and administered by the Internal Revenue Service are one thing; the Family Security Act proposed by Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, which would give families a monthly payment administered through the Social Security Administration is quite another.

Conservatives will have to make distinctions and draw lines in the sand to determine how much government expansion we are going to tolerate to accomplish these policy goals. Creating another welfare program through the Social Security Administration seems to go well beyond pro-family tax reform. If conservatives are willing to accept that some pro-family policies may be good even if they come with taxpayer expense and a new government program, we need to start developing a framework to distinguish good family policy from bad.

Pennsylvanias new Child and Dependent Care Enhancement Program that was just passed in the commonwealths budget is a perfect example of bad family policy mistakenly being celebrated as good family policy. It would be one thing if this were passed in a state thoroughly controlled by Democrats. But both houses of the Pennsylvania Legislature are controlled by Republicans. Budgets are creatures of compromise, and there is nothing wrong with Republicans moving toward tax policies that encourage having more children. But conservatives need to be wary of how such pro-family policy is crafted and what preferences are contained within such policies. Republican legislators must take care that they are not unwittingly embracing leftist ideals in the name of pro-family reform.

Supporters point out that this new tax credit will help low-income families by defraying the costs of childcare. But those same supporters are falsely claiming that the tax credit is fashioned after the federal child tax credit, which was increased by the American Rescue Plan in 2021. There is a big, clear difference between the federal tax credit and the new Pennsylvania tax credit: The federal credit is a tax credit given to families under a certain annual income, based on how many dependent children they have. The new Pennsylvania credit allows parents to recoup a percentage of their childcare expenses.

At least someone in the Pennsylvania papers caught the difference, to a certain extent. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editorial board realized the obvious: Some people choose to make sacrifices to have a parent stay home with their children. Others are too poor to afford costly childcare and rely on family members to take care of their children while they are at work. Both these categories of parents are apparently excluded from the Pennsylvania tax credit because they are not paying for daycare.

The editorial calls for at least a smaller standard credit of a few hundred dollars per child for those who choose to keep care in the family. This proposed compromise is still inadequate. Both for reasons of fairness and of good social policy, it is bad for the government to incentivize full-time institutional daycare rather than a family caring for its own children full-time.

The editorial points out what should be common sense: Most of the time, a two-income family earns more money than a one-income family. If families choose for a parent to stay home and care for children full-time, that is an economic sacrifice for most families. If the purpose of these daycare tax credits is to ease the costly burdens of childcare, why does the policy only ease the burden of daycare and not the burden of the one-income family who sacrifices a second income to keep a parent home for childcare?

This is not merely an economically unfair governmental choice. There is a serious and insidious social policy preference in the childcare tax credit. Most tax policies express preferential choices. Corporate entities are taxed differently often more favorably than individuals because we acknowledge that incentivizing LLCs, corporations, and partnerships to be more profitable creates jobs and produces good results for society. In kind payments (payments made with products, services, or something other than cash) are still treated as taxable income because we prefer not to let businesses get away with not paying taxes by bartering. And we have a federal child tax credit because we prefer people to have children. Each of these examples has both an economic reason (it is good for our economy to have this preference) and a moral one (it is good for our society to be this way).

The childcare tax credit adopted in Pennsylvania is not good for our society because it expresses a bad policy preference. If a family has children, both the mother and father work outside the home, and the family uses full-time institutional daycare for the children, the government will subsidize that with thousands of dollars in tax credits. If a family has children and one parent works while the other stays home to care for the children, the government does not subsidize the parents decision to stay home with the children. If both parents work (or if it is a single-parent household) and the children are cared for by a relative, the government also does not offer the tax credit. There is a clear policy preference expressed by the Pennsylvania government: It is better for families with children to have two working parents and to pay someone else to care for their children. This is bad policy.

There are many reasons it is beneficial for families to have a parent stay at home with children. Children tend to do better educationally when a parent stays home with them and/or chooses to homeschool. There is also good research suggesting that children develop more behavioral problems like stress and aggression when cared for full-time by out-of-home daycare rather than by a stay-at-home parent. Admittedly there are challenges for stay-at-home parents, such as the desire to return to work outside the home and the danger of social isolation. But having a stay-at-home parent is a good decision for raising intelligent, well-adjusted children.

Society benefits from having more intelligent, well-adjusted children. So the government should enact policies that encourage a parent to stay at home and be the full-time caretaker for children. If families decide they want or need two incomes to support their household, they are free to make that choice. But when the government actually incentivizes the decision to have ones children cared for full-time by a paid childcare institution rather than by the childrens own parents, it raises a question: Is this really good for families, for children, for society? Or is the government incentivizing the further distortion of the natural family? Is this a proper pro-family policy or a nod to socialism?

Incentivizing families to have more children through child tax credits, like the current federal tax code does, is a reasonable policy preference for conservatives concerned about our nations demographic decline. Subsidizing only those families who choose full-time institutional daycare, while disincentivizing families choosing to have a stay-at-home parent or using extended family for childcare, favors a socialist understanding of family and work life. Conservatives in general and Republican legislators in particular should be sensitive to this distinction.

Frank DeVito is an attorney living in eastern Pennsylvania with his wife and three young children. His work has previously been published in The American Conservative, the Quinnipiac Law Review and the Penn State Online Law Review.

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Discouraging Parents From Raising Their Own Kids Isn't Pro-Family - The Federalist

More than a hundred pregnancy centers across the country have been vandalized this year in response to the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Nevertheless, the Department of Justice still has done nothing about this despite pledging to conduct investigations. Most politicians and the corporate media seem completely uninterested in discussing the matter, much less calling for any action.

When given the opportunity to be on the right side of this problem with a proposed resolution to condemn the violence, House Democrats promptly voted against it. They made it clear that they do not want to defend pregnancy centers. They believe violence against these places is acceptable.

Even though its well known that leftists like to celebrate abortion and are upset about the recent decision of Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization, its hard to fathom why they should hate pregnancy centers. These organizations help women with their pregnancies, offering all kinds of support during and after pregnancy. They arent harassing abortionists or marching in the streets and disrupting traffic. They are fully pro-woman and work to offer a choice besides abortion for desperate mothers.

Nevertheless, Democrats have demonized pregnancy centers. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., wants to shut all of them down because they fool people who are looking for pregnancy termination and torture expecting mothers by offering them a way to have their baby safely. Although pro-lifers have rightly criticized Warren for these remarks, many on the left tacitly agree with her.

But why? Not only is it flatly contradictory to come out as pro-choice and yet eliminate the choice to have a baby, but its also wrong to bully charitable organizations that serve vulnerable mothers. Why do pregnancy centers draw so much hate?

One reason is that pregnancy centers are bad for the abortion business. Because people are constantly bombarded by the pro-abortion rhetoric of liberation and female empowerment, they tend to forget that Planned Parenthood and every other abortion provider is a business seeking to make money. Pregnancy centers cut into their profits by taking away clients and siphoning off public funding. In response, they lobby Congress and donate to political campaigns like Warrens in order to hamstring and shut down their competitors.

Another reason is that pregnancy centers are the most powerful refutation of abortion. They enable women to endure the difficulties associated with carrying a child and bringing it to term. They provide the material, emotional, and spiritual support necessary to have a baby. Besides giving that child a chance for a healthy and happy life, they do the same for mothers who suffer from abuse, poverty, and several other challenges.

Understanding this is essential. Although most debates over abortion often center on the question of personhood, the real reason most women seek an abortion is that having a baby is difficult. Even if a mother makes the heart-wrenching decision to put her child up for adoption, she still has to go through nine months of pregnancy and delivery. Her body, mind, and soul will be tested, and, at times, it will feel overwhelming.

Once the baby is born, these difficulties continue. Infants are needy and fragile. They continue demanding everything from the mother, who, in turn, will require a great deal of assistance from the father or whoever else is around to lend a hand. For the typical modern adult accustomed to an easy job, abundant leisure, and relatively few responsibilities, having a baby is more than merely disruptive; it is traumatic.

However, despite this, most parents will say a family is worth it. Yes, theres often pain, suffering, and boredom, but just as often, theres joy, fulfillment, and fun. With a child, there may be many trials, but there are no regrets. With abortion, there may be fewer trials, but regret will always be present.

This is why the goal of the pro-abortion crowd is less about explaining away the humanity of the unborn and more about making parenthood seem impossible. They will play up the rigors of pregnancy, childbirth, and childrearing while downplaying the accompanying rewards. Simultaneously, they will portray abortion as a consequence-free escape that will enable women to live their best lives.

In this most recent vote, Democrats have shown their hand. More than pro-life protests, pro-life media, or even pro-life politicians voting to outlaw abortions, they fear women who are in dire circumstances deciding to have their children. If word gets out that its possible to make it through pregnancy, have a child, and take care of that child in its infancy, many women may start to realize just how unnecessary and abominable the alternative is.

The pro-abortion left operates on the assumption that all women are weak, selfish, and unable to succeed as mothers. Pregnancy centers thwart these assumptions by empowering women and helping them turn what seems like a problem into a blessing with limitless potential. If Democrats choose to condemn these organizations, the pro-life movement needs to support them all the more by sharing in the work of helping mothers and building up a pro-family culture.

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Here's Why Democrats Have Waged War On Pregnancy Centers - The Federalist

New York Times opinion columnist Bret Stephens admitted in a snarky article headlined I Was Wrong About Trump Voters that Democrats ploy to undermine Donald Trump was truly a hoax.

While most of the corrupt press and institutions such as the Pulitzer Prize board still refuse to acknowledge that the discredited Steele dossier and every piece of information Hillary Clintons campaign fed to the corporate media about Trump colluding with Russia was hogwash, Stephens finally acknowledges that the Republican was unfairly targeted.

To this day, precious few anti-Trumpers have been honest with themselves about the elaborate hoax theres just no other word for it that was the Steele dossier and all the bogus allegations, credulously parroted in the mainstream media, that flowed from it, Stephens wrote.

Six years after the Steele dossier was commissioned by Fusion GPS which was hired by Clintons campaign lawyers firm, someone in the propaganda press has finally granted what real reporters such as The Federalists Spygate experts have known all along.

Stephens article is far from the apology the headline portrays it to be. But in conceding that the corporate media, in addition to intelligence agencies and the Democrat party, waged a war on Trump, the NYT writer has done more than any other journo or outlet that spread lies and misinformation about the nonexistent collusion and pee tapes.

Unfortunately, its not enough. Stephens, who has been in the media world for decades, does not apologize nor take any responsibility for participating in the medias collusion hoax factory. He shows no remorse for writing articles that affirmed the Steele dossier, nor does he acknowledge that his employer is guilty of mass publishing lie-ridden stories about Trump and the Russians.

If a guy who was complicit in the Democrats scheme to keep Trump out of office is admitting the reality of the Russia collusion story is that there was no collusion, every outlet that has refused to admit any error is even worse than he is.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

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Bret Stephens Is First In Big Media To Admit Russian Collusion Was A 'Hoax' - The Federalist