The Fall of a Philosopher King and the Attack on Liberty
Article audio sponsored by The John Birch Society

You may have heard of Professor Neil Ferguson. He’s the expert in the U.K. that predicted COVID-19 would infect and kill everyone and whose doomsday scenarios resulted directly in the lockdown in his own country and contributed to the knife in the the back of freedom that was wielded by mostly liberal-progressive governors and their quisling compatriot technocrats here in the United States.

It turns out that Professor Ferguson decided he didn’t need the lockdown he demands for everyone else. According to the Telegraph, Ferguson figured he could have his married consort visit him at his house despite the lockdown in London.

According to the Telegraph, “The revelation of the ‘illegal’ trysts will infuriate millions of couples living apart who the government has banned from meeting up during the lockdown, now in its seventh week.”

The paper reported that Ferguson’s married girlfriend “travelled across London from her south London home to spend time with the government scientist, nicknamed Professor Lockdown.”

“I deeply regret any undermining of the clear messages around the continued need for social distancing to control this devastating epidemic,” Ferguson said in response to having been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

Naturally, in keeping with modern liberal-progressive radicals, Ferguson’s paramour apparently disdains the tenets of traditional, boring old marriage, preferring a more hipster alternative “lifestyle.” The delicate lady, the paper reports, is “a left-wing campaigner” who lives with her husband and “their two children in a £1.9m home but are understood to be in an open marriage.”

Take note, normal Americans: These are the types of people who desire to be your rulers and who, using the power of political propaganda, are currently spreading fear in an overt attempt to convince the people of America and the world to surrender their freedoms.

Alas, poor Ferguson has now felt he must resign his post at SAGE — that’s the “Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies,” the U.K.’s group of would-be philosopher kings that, according to the Daily Mail, “advises the government on tackling the pandemic.”

In other words, it’s the U.K. group that demands replacement of a free economy and the shackling of free people in the effort to impose Soviet-style government management and planning.

Indeed, we are now regularly reminded that poor, enstupified citizens “must listen to the experts” when it comes to living our “new” pandemic lifestyle. Well, communism is a good example of the implementation of “rule by experts,” with the ultimate example of this species of malignant government being the Soviet system of the 1970s. That was the “golden era” of Soviet government. The economy was “booming.” Except the “booming” was the sound of impending implosion.

Just like today, back in those halcyon days of the Soviet period, people needed permission to move around. Just like today, basic foodstuffs and other products were hard to get and were randomly available and citizens had to line up to get them, if they were lucky. Just like today, you couldn’t tell who was watching you or who was snitching on you to the internal security apparatus. Just like today, the technocratic philosopher kings of Soviet communism were known for their lack of moral fiber and for their insatiable debauchery. Just like today, dissidents were repressed. Many escaped to seek asylum in the West, fabled land of the free.

Oh, wait — there is one difference. Today our dissidents have to escape to the fabled land of freedom in Russia.

Today’s “experts” such as Ferguson are fastening a modern version of Soviet communism on the formerly free world under the guise of fighting a pandemic. Of course, even once this pandemic fades away, another is going to come some day. And there are innumerable other dangers inherent to life. For protection, we need the guidance of our cadre of “experts” forever, we are supposed to believe.

Just comply comrade, and all will be well.

This is not what our Founders intended. Real experts, they understood the dangers posed by those hungry for power and attempted to construct a Constitution that would restrain and stymie the machinations of the power-hungry. Much has been done since the founding to undermine the Constitution as originally constructed — enough, it seems, to allow the political wolves into the streets where today they threaten the law-abiding with a massacre of fundamental freedoms.

These wolves must be returned to their kennels and the doors of their confinement again bound with the chains of a Constitution reinvigorated by an alarmed citizenry jealous of their liberties.

Fail, and the “experts” such as Ferguson will rule the day with their craven decree that freedom must be sacrificed in favor of their version of safety.

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Image: Thomas Angus/Wikimedia Commons

Dennis Behreandt is a research professional and writer, frequently covering subjects in history, theology, and science and technology. He has worked as an editor and publisher and is a former managing editor of The New American.