Since early days, Democrats have pushed increasingly onerous regulations in response to the Wuhan coronavirus.
Lockdowns — which the World Health Organization disavows except in very narrow, short-term circumstances and which are unsupported by science — have dragged on and on. Teachers unions kept schools closed month after month in blue states, and even children as young as 2 are being forced to mask despite no scientific support for doing so.
Indeed, masking has become a political statement, to the point that Democrats routinely report wearing masks outdoors simply to ensure they won’t be mistaken for Republicans.
Anyone who disagreed with this approach was accused of “spreading misinformation,” engaging in “conspiracy theories” and generally wanting everyone’s grandma to die.
Mandatory vaccination became an article of faith, even for those with natural immunity, which evidence suggests is at least as good as that produced by the vaccines. Many Democrats supported rules designed to punish the unvaccinated, to exclude them from restaurants, stores, schools — pretty much everywhere outside their own homes.
It was like a return to the Middle Ages, with the modern equivalent of shouts of “Leper! Outcast! Unclean!” aimed at the unvaxxed. And the definition of “fully vaccinated” kept changing to require more and more shots.
As recently as last month, when newly elected Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin ended mandatory mask rules in Virginia public schools, Democrats were calling him, essentially, a mass murderer.
But that was then. All of a sudden, we are told, “The science has changed.”
No, really, those were the words of CNN medical “expert” Dr. Leana Wen, leading Reason’s Robby Soave to ask, “Has anything fundamentally changed in the last six months, except for Democrats finally, belatedly realizing that militant masking is a political loser? The science didn’t change, the politics changed.”
And boy did they. At long last, the public has had enough, and there’s outright rebellion against COVID overreach everywhere, with demonstrations in Europe, Australia, the United States.
Famously in Canada, truckers have occupied the grounds of the national Parliament in Ottawa, honking their horns and demanding change. In front of the House of Commons, meanwhile, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s defense of ever-stricter COVID restrictions got him mocked and jeered by members, with opposition leader Candice Bergen challenging him to “follow the science, follow the evidence, end the restrictions, end the mandates.”
Canadian provinces are starting to drop their rules. Alberta caved to the truckers and ended its vaccine-passport regulation. Trudeau is even facing defections from his own party, as Liberal Party member Joel Lightbound denounced mandatory vaccinations. Trudeau’s efforts to smear the truckers as Russian agents, Nazis and perpetrators of “anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, anti-Black racism, homophobia and transphobia” failed as it turns out a majority of Canadians support the truckers and want COVID restrictions lifted.
(Is there anything more pathetic than the way the West’s ruling class labels anyone who opposes it as racist, sexist, Islamophobic, transphobic, etc.? Literally every single time.)
Likewise in the United States, COVID rules are suddenly falling. Just weeks after Youngkin was called a murderer for ending mask rules, Democrats in the Virginia Senate voted with Republicans to pass a statute . . . ending mask rules. Connecticut’s Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont is ending school mask rules as of the end of this month. Colorado’s Democratic Gov. Jared Polis is doing the same.
We’re seeing similar actions from New Jersey’s Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy and Delaware’s Democratic Gov. John Carney. (Georgia’s wannabe governor Stacey Abrams backs masking in schools but not enough to stop her taking her own mask off for a photo opportunity with masked kids.)
In the words of blogger Lawrence Person, “Not since the collapse of the Hindenburg Line in 1918 have such bitterly held positions been abandoned so quickly.”
President Joe Biden hasn’t caught up with the trend yet, with spokeswoman Jen Psaki reiterating that the White House supports masking in schools. But they don’t call him “Slow Joe” for nothing. He’ll catch up.
Because while the science may not have actually changed, the surveys certainly have. Biden has tanked in the polls, with disapproval over approval by double digits. Judging by Dems’ actions, their internal polls are probably even worse.
You don’t need a weatherman to see which way the wind blows, and the political winds are moving toward a dismantlement of the past two years’ COVID excesses. It’s about time.
Glenn Harlan Reynolds is a professor of law at the University of Tennessee and founder of the InstaPundit.com blog.
