As IF Times

source: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/cuomo-blasts-police-wont-enforce-thanksgiving-gathering-limits

Ten years ago, if I had written about the absurdities that are taking place now in society, culture and politics, it would have been viewed as drug addled delusion.

If we had forecast that the entire planet would fall under the spell of political operatives and forced to cower behind paper masks to repel an illness that statistically has no more lethality than a seasonal flu, it would sound off the charts preposterous.  But as we know, this is what has happened.  We recall that at the outset, a quarantine period of 14 days was required to quell the chances of a greater outbreak.

Fourteen days…how bad can that be?  Now, nine months later, it doesn’t appear as if restrictions will be abating any time soon.  Indeed, it’s going the other way.  Despite all the assurances of containment, herd immunity, yada, yada, yada, the danger apparently is even more ominous than it was almost a year ago.  As a consequence, new improved restrictions are being imposed by the political geniuses who are of course following the science.

All of a sudden, restricting people at Thanksgiving gatherings, religious assemblies and for that matter, anything to do with normal human interaction is to be restricted or outright banned.  Some rulers have even declared that Christmas is cancelled.  So, in order to curtail an imaginary pandemic, people cannot work, cannot go out to eat, cannot shop, cannot have friends over, cannot have family gatherings, cannot practice their religions and cannot even circulate in public without paper masks.  But, apparently, these are only minor inconveniences in order to serve the greater good.  We’d sure like to know who this greater good guy is.

On the very near horizon is the possibility of forced vaccinations and certificates thereof in order to access such common societal things such as banking, work, school, restaurants and air travel.  Recall that the left loved to use the scenario portrayed in the novel The Handmaiden’s Tale as a warning of a dark, dystopian controlled society.  The greatest surprise is not that ideological tyrants impose what they can get away with on their subjects; it’s that people comply even as their most fundamental freedoms are being cut off.  Worse than that, people are actually exhorting others to co-operate.  It’s Stockholm Syndrome on steroids.

We are asked to believe that an obviously afflicted dementia patient had won the popular vote for President of the United States when he couldn’t convince enough people to fill a phone booth during his total of 2 campaign rallies.  Despite clear mathematical and anecdotal evidence of voting corruption, the partisans are insisting on the veracity of the clearly manipulated results.  We are told that riots, killings and property destruction in support of his candidacy are actually peaceful displays of opinion.

If all of these measures are implemented to keep us safe, I think we’d all rather roll the dice and live dangerously instead.

source:  https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/newsoms-office-tells-californians-to-wear-masks-in-between-bites-of-food-when-dining-with-members-from-same-household-in-public

As time drags on with what I’ll call the Prison Pandemic and we now enter the 10th month of a touted 14 day safe period, the edicts from the ruling regents are becoming more and more draconian and not less as would be expected and logical.  The classic children’s plea of ‘are we there yet’ has never felt more apt.  Like Gilligan’s Island, a 3 hour tour has turned into an apparent life sentence.  If 14 days is a safe period and herd immunity is allowed to take its effect in a society, 10 months is a pretty wide safety margin, even for the most ardent hang wringers.  Or so you would think.

It’s not as if people are collapsing everywhere like pro sports ratings;  the nation’s mortality number and rates have stabilized.  Recall that even the CDC had quietly revealed that of the just over 200,000 deaths attributed to Covid, only 6% were directly caused by Covid.  The rest had ancillary health issues.  In addition, we have a control group society which did the opposite of what most Western nations did and that is Sweden.  They did not lock down, did not impose mask edicts and only exhorted their citizens to socially distance and be careful….as if addressing intelligent adults.  Images from that nation show people going about their daily business, eating at street-side cafes, working and recreating as would be the case in any normal society.  Surprise, surprise, their infection and mortality rates are negligible, their hospital emergency rooms are empty and mask companies are going out of business there.

Even with these bald facts at their disposal, political tyrants in the civilized and developed West continue to enact crazier decrees in order to express their control over their subjects.  The latest edict from California’s Newsom has crossed the line of ensuring public safety to apparently simply enforcing personal whims.  We expect that very soon, masks will be required in showers and while sleeping. Pets will be considered transmitters as well, so they will need to go.   Not content with the cruelties inflicted upon their populace thus far, they now warn of the second wave…because the first one was kind of a dud.  People of course are still free to die, but as long as it’s not from Covid, it’s acceptable.

How can this happen?  How can an intelligent and informed society submit to the edicts of their very misinformed and power drunk public overseers?

Well it turns out that people are pre-disposed to obey rules.  Something in people’s DNA tilts them towards compliance even with no real reason to do so.  A social psychologist named Stanley Milgram made some revealing studies while teaching at Yale in the 1960’s.  In one of his most famous experiments, subjects were placed in a room adjacent to another apparent subject who was wired with electrical probes.   In fact, the wired subject was a confederate who was to aid in the experiment.  The test subject was then told to punish the confederate plant with increasing jolts of electricity if he answered the questions of the moderator incorrectly.

The ‘voltage’ continued to increase as did the screams and discomfort of the confederate.  Even as the test subject felt anxious, they continued to obey the exhortations of the moderator despite the evident pain of the confederate and despite there being no reason to obey the orders.  This revelation about human nature has been harnessed by many smart people in the years since that time. From subliminal advertising techniques all the way to more sinister applications including of course, spy-craft, this human frailty has been weaponized.

People who attain power in political office seem to innately understand this trait of most people and they use it to their utmost advantage.  Employed legitimately, they can inspire patriotism and a sense of duty to a nation or cause.  Unfortunately, this power has been used far less admirably by politicos as they drive the recent crisis.  They have been able to tap into the meek and submissive element that is present in a large part of the population so that they essentially, enslave themselves.  Combined with gaslighting paranoia, they have been able to cripple an entire society with their own fears.