The way I see it: Return to reality can’t happen under the current circumstances. The powers that be have painted themselves into a corner. There is no scenario under which society fully reopens that doesn’t entail a risk of contagion. Accepting this risk is an implicit acknowledgement that past policy was misguided or unpopular, even if only temporarily — which is something normal people can grapple with, but not those typically drawn to positions of power.
Those who’ve been orchestrating our Covid countermeasures need, on a psychological level, to maintain the ruse that their bureaucratic busybodying keeps everyone two steps ahead of the virus, even if data prove the opposite. Americans need to understand that Dr. Fauci and his ilk are never going to give their blessing for a complete reopening.
The good news is that all the current trends offer encouraging data to anyone valuing freedom. Initially almost everyone was predisposed to trust the self-assured “experts” that social distancing/masks/forced confinement, while huge impositions, were ultimately the only ways to defeat Covid. But now the results are available for all to see, and they show the same thing: the virus follows its own curve, regardless of the policy being imposed on a local level. The only effect politicians can have is by forcing at-risk populations to be needlessly exposed, as Gov. Cuomo did, killing tens of thousands.
If anything, lockdowns are correlated with higher rates of infection, not lower; masks have had a statistically insignificant impact everywhere they’ve been mandated; social distancing might help temporarily slow transmission, but we also know there’s only a tiny percentage of the society actually at risk of dying from Covid — any intelligent policy should thus focus on protecting the vulnerable, not indefinitely halting healthy societal interaction.
That means our freedom will only come back when people stop waiting for permission. By reclaiming our power from the powerful, and once again living life by our own terms.
Yes, this could result in some new outbreaks, but the for the most part, those who were going to die from Covid already have. It’s a joke to think we need to be freaking out every time we hear about positive tests on college campuses. Our hospitals have plenty of capacity to handle any new blips in the curve, and the science is now well enough established to know that for 99 percent of the population, there’s basically zero chance of dying from Covid. With a bit of luck, people will soon start doing whatever they want, defying the stern warnings being issued from Washington and the major media, and we’ll see for ourselves that their predicted Covid catastrophe never materializes. If these “experts” were truly dispassionate, data-driven public servants, they would then acknowledge botching things so badly, but you can be sure that never happens.
In a republic, elected leaders derive their power through the consent of the governed. Do you still consent? Will you obey every new arbitrary imposition these discredited “experts” dream up?
For America to be free once more, the people must assert their independence — to stop asking, start asserting, and when resistance is encountered, to defy and disobey and to declare our God-given right to live in liberty.
At the very least, if Covid re-awakens that collective yearning to live as a free people, then at least something positive will have come from this wretched experience. But without this kind of popular uprising, I don’t see how we’ll ever return to anything like “normal.”
We’ll all see soon enough.