Politics
Coronavirus: Freedom Is the Cure

Coronavirus: Freedom Is the Cure

Governments around the world are trying to stop the coronavirus by curbing the market and stopping the lives of hundreds of millions of people. To stop the pandemic, the opposite approach is desperately needed. ...
Dennis Behreandt

As this is being written (the end of March), important nations of the world are on lockdown. Important states in America are on lockdown. Nearly 100 million Americans have been ordered not to leave their homes. Politicians in Israel have openly debated the possibility of eliminating all personal freedoms. Police and National Guard troops are going door-to-door in Rhode Island searching for contraband visitors (especially New Yorkers), raising the specter of martial law. It sounds impossibly apocalyptic, like something out of a bad sci-fi movie featuring the imminent arrival of inscrutable, implacable, and hostile aliens, but it’s true.

And, it’s poised at this writing to get even worse. According to Haaretz, Sigal Sadetsky, the head of Israel’s public health services, made reference to the Chinese approach to handling the coronavirus pandemic in remarks to the Knesset Subcommittee on Intelligence and Secret Services. She told them, the paper reported, “that she believes ‘everyone will do the same thing.’” Questioned about whether she was advocating a lockdown or curfew, her answer was chilling. “A lockdown and personal monitoring of people, and a total halt to personal freedom,” she answered.

She may as well have been speaking for statists everywhere, including in America. As of this writing, the National Guard has been called out in 28 states, and many state governors have issued edicts forcing people to stay indoors. Across the country, businesses deemed not essential have been closed. Alarmingly, with the urging of Democrats in state governments and in Congress, the president activated the Defense Production Act, the 1950s Korean War-era law that empowers the executive branch of the federal government to take over some or all of the economy as it deems necessary to fight a crisis.

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