by James Bovard
The American Institute for Economic Research
Over the past year, Americans’ rights and liberties have been ravaged worse than almost anyone expected at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. Fearmongering quickly proved the ticket for politicians to seize almost unlimited power. But heavy-handed government decrees were more effective at wrecking lives than at vanquishing a virus.
My first attack on Covid hysteria came out last March 24 in the Daily Caller. “Pandemic Security Theater Is Self-Destructive, And Won’t Make Us Safer” scoffed at President Trump’s proclamations that “we are at war with an invisible enemy,” and “I’m a wartime president.” In Washington, wartime presidents are usually exalted as if they personally received a mission from God. “The pandemic threatens to open authoritarian Pandora’s Boxes. Permitting governments to seize almost unlimited power based on shaky extrapolations of infection rates will doom our republic,” the piece concluded.