One of the signs that Ronald Reagan noted as an indication that the Soviet Union had entered a state of advanced decrepitude socially and economically were news reports in late 1980 in both the Washington Post and Los Angeles Times about three separate freight trains bound from Moscow to Odessa that simply disappeared, victims apparently of piracy.
One wonders whether Russia, currently contemplating reassembling the Soviet empire starting with the Ukraine perhaps at any moment, is looked out at events in the United States and wondering if we’re slipping into a similar decadence and decrepitude. I refer to the shocking photos out of Los Angeles of widespread thievery from freight trains.
Even the Los Angeles Times has noticed:
Union Pacific has complained directly and bluntly to LA’s soft-on-crime district attorney George Gascon, who does nothing. See especially the circled part on the second page, which is unusually blunt for a private company:
This is liberal America, 2022.
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