Reflections on the lockdown, civil disobedience and other issues brought to the fore by the coronavirus pandemic.

Hey, Ms. Mayor, the lakefront belongs to the people.

Her Lordship, Mayor Lori Lightfoot, has closed the Chicago lakefront, , the 606 trail and city parks to the  public. Cower at home. And if you don’t, you’re evil.

Her order is supposedly based on “science.” But has she not heard that science has concluded that you’re safer from coronavirus in the fresh air outside than in stuffy confines indoors? Here’s one:

Conclusions: All identified outbreaks of three or more cases occurred in an indoor environment, which confirms that sharing indoor space is a major SARS-CoV-2 infection risk.

Someone should ask her highness how she figures she’ll enforce this arbitrary, unscientific command. Fed up Chicagoans eventually won’t pay attention and decide where the hell they can go on their own.

I fear this another example of how Chicago is moving away from its historic commitment to protect and honor its most precious resource, the lakefront. It’s the same with the Obama Presidential Center, that gobbles up acres of Jackson Park to build an ugly monument to the former president’s ego. By the way, oral arguments are scheduled to be heard on May 21 in the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in a citizens lawsuit against that land grab.

No school until fall?

This threat keeps popping up, warning that if the schools reopen in fall that we are, in essence, child killers.

The costs to children of being out of school continues to mount and arrives in the form of stolen childhoods, depression, increased cases of attention-deficit and hyperactivity disorders, more acting out, lost class time and falling behind intellectually and emotionally…should I go on?  The science of epidemiology does not include these topics. So where the hell are all those education experts? All they going to let this happen?

Have the Bill of Rights been suspended?

You might think so, the way assorted governors, mayors and other high and mighyt officials have assumed dictatorial powers to tell us what we can do and where and when we can go.

The lawsuit against Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker is a clear-cut case of a public official exceeding his power beyond the 30 days that the Legislature has authorized. It has become a cliche, but it’s true: There is no pandemic exception in the Bill of Rights.

The Left abandons its admiration and defense of civil disobedience

Younger generations don’t remember or appreciate the role of civil disobedience in political and societal change. But years ago, the Left used civil disobedience to fight Jim Crow and the Vietnam War, citing it as a necessary moral tool to fight oppression.

Its definition:

On the most widely accepted account of civil disobedience, famously defended by John Rawls (1971), civil disobedience is a public, non-violent and conscientious breach of law undertaken with the aim of bringing about a change in laws or government policies. On this account, people who engage in civil disobedience are willing to accept the legal consequences of their actions, as this shows their fidelity to the rule of law. Civil disobedience, given its place at the boundary of fidelity to law, is said to fall between legal protest, on the one hand, and conscientious refusal, revolutionary action, militant protest and organised forcible resistance, on the other hand.

Now the left has turned on civil disobedience with a vengeance against people who are fighting the unjust and illegal shuttering of their businesses, restrictions on their constitutionally protected liberties and more. It’s a sad commentary and where America is heading. And where, I wonder, is the ACLU?

Most we wait until we find a coronavirus cure before the country reopens?

This was not the purpose of the lockdown. Originally, the shelter-in-place and other lockdown orders were intended to “flatten the curve,” meaning getting control of the spread so that hospitals wouldn’t be overwhelmed with COVID-19 cases. Turns out the extra emergency beds that were established to meet the expected demand lay empty and were being taken down.

By that standard, the lockdown should have been eased except for the most jeopardized groups, namely the elderly and people with underlying health issues. But now, “the goal posts have been moved,” as we hear that in some jurisdictions the lockdown won’t be lifted until the cure arrives. That might never happen. So, just how long will the lockdowns continue as the economy and individual lives are pushed over the cliff?

dennis@dennisbyrne.net

www.dennisbyrne.net 

My historical novel: Madness: The War of 1812

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