Oct
3
Will U.S. Become COVID Police State Like Australia?
“[Z]ero cases actually means zero jobs. It means zero hope. It actually means zero freedom at the end of the day because you’re not getting on with life.” — Evan Mulholland, director of communications at the Institute of Public Affairs in Australia
As a result of fears over the spread of COVID-19, Australia has instituted some rather extreme — even draconian — measures to reach their goal of zero COVID cases. (Many say this is an unrealistic goal.) Most lockdown and travel restrictions have been made by unelected health bureaucrats with “extraordinary powers under open-ended emergency legislation.” (E.g., the “COVID-19 Response Division”.) Though there is some variation from state to state, here are a few examples of what is going on in the land Down Under:
— At least four Australian states & territories are in complete lockdown, which means no one goes in or out of them; this most harshly affects roughly half of the 25M population, centered around the largest cities
— There is a growing number of “internally displaced” people who are not allowed to return home after legally visiting another region (when it was still allowed)
— Outdoor mask mandates and stringent occupancy restrictions are strongly enforced
— As per Gideon Rozner, the director of policy at the Institute of Public Affairs, at National Review, “Our lockdowns are also among the world’s harshest. Here in Melbourne, you’re permitted to leave your home for no longer than two hours a day for exercise and once more to go to the shops. A curfew is in place between 9 p.m. and 5 a.m. Travel farther than three miles from your home is prohibited. Fines for breaching these and sundry subsidiary restrictions range from $1,300 to $15,000 (U.S. dollars).”
— Government-mandated phone apps are pinged randomly, requiring recipients to respond with a pic of their current location; not doing so will result in the cops paying their residence a visit
— The Sydney Morning Herald reported that several dogs at a NSW rescue were shot dead to prevent shelter workers from traveling to pick them up
— Law enforcement officials can legally “[b]reak into any land, building, structure or vehicle using whatever force necessary” and can “[c]ompel people to give information”
— Anti-lockdown protesters are met with rubber bullets, tasers, pepper spray, and tear gas; they are typically arrested and often fined for “incitement” and/or defying health orders
— In one incident caught on camera, “a pedestrian crossing a street refused to stop for the police and was struck by a police car”; cops then kicked him in the head, which appeared to cause his face to strike the pavement
— Various other incidents have been reported of law enforcement acting callously and/or with brutality against people guilty of things like just walking in the park — an obvious violation of current rules but hardly cause for violent response
— A COVID quarantine facility (aka “detention center” or “internment camp”) is being built outside of Brisbane, for example
According to Buck Sexton at American Consequences, while Australian leaders may point to their very low COVID spread and fatality rate — 1,256 deaths out of 100,000 cases — as proof that their authoritarian policies work, the data indicates that there is likely another reason for those low numbers. Namely, Australia is a relatively isolated nation with a sparse population. (Roughly 63% of its 25.8 million people are located in and around the five biggest cities — Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide.)
Even if geography wasn’t a better explanation, is the enactment of such protocols — protocols that squelch freedom, kill hope, violate inalienable rights, take serious tolls on small businesses and the economy, and actually put people’s mental and physical health at risk — truly justified? It is wise? Do we really want to give Big Brother such power over us? (See earlier quotes by Mulholland and Rozner, two Australians who actually gets it.)
Sexton writes:
“Apart from the debate over how to best suppress a virus (other than living on a remote island that can entirely restrict travel), there’s a very real concern growing that COVID policies are turning westernized societies into much more authoritarian places.
If the government can shut down your business or church, and even mandate that you stay inside your own home for weeks on end — all to combat a virus with a 99.7% survival rate — what can the government not do in the name of “public health”?
It’s not just Australia where these concerns have taken a turn into tyrannical reality… The U.S. has more than its share of statist demagogues in office, and the Biden administration appears equally drunk with power and incompetent with its hands on the steering wheel of government, especially when it comes to COVID….”
Matt Vespa points out that “Australia is the only western nation that does not have a bill of rights. This is what happens when the citizenry just blithely lets the government trample all over them.” It didn’t happen all at once, but it’s worth noting that Australians passed various gun control measures in the 1990s (and later) that made it very difficult for a private citizen to obtain a firearm license. Protection of one’s person and/or property are not considered “genuine” reasons.
Sexton concludes:
“While half of America seems determined to resist the worst of the Fauciite madness, the other half currently has the power of the White House, Congress, and the media to torture the public spirit with endless stupid COVID rules.
We are not yet Australia… But if Biden and his minions could lock the mask deniers and vaccine questioners away for weeks on end, they would gladly do so — and luxuriate in sanctimony all the while.”
Don’t think this can’t happen in the U.S., folks. And remember, our Bill of Rights was written to protect citizens from the government, not the other way around. The 2nd Amendment in particular was not written to allow one to hunt or shoot skeet but to recognize that citizens have the right to protect themselves, including against the State. This is precisely why Biden, Harris, and other Leftist influencers are pushing for mask/vax mandates and exactly the sort of gun control laws — and other ways to undermine or nullify much of the Constitution and Bill of Rights — that got Australia to where it is now.
We cannot let this happen!
