COVID-19: Catalyst for New Socialist America

**Warning: use of light profanity as quoted by others contained within**

So my blog has been inactive for quite some time as I focused on my family, career and the completion of my fantasy trilogy. Well… Today marks my birthday, the 27th time I have recognized the occasion, to be precise, but it is also the first time that it passed me by for most of the day without my even realizing it was the 24th. As it turns out, March 24th, 2020 will likely be marked in my own personal history as the birthday most remembered not for celebration of life but of a fear so deeply rooted within me that I did not mark the date, nor even know at first that it had come to pass. But what fear, you ask? Terror for our nation, and for freedom as it has been defined in America for over two hundred years.

Relax, you might say… Everything will be back to normal in just a few weeks. Really? If you believe that whole-heartedly, then you are misguided. If you hope it to be true, then you are aligned with my own spirit, for it is hope alone and no longer with certainty that I cling to the idea of freedom in America reigning supreme. You see, we have allowed ourselves in a matter of days, not even weeks or months, to grow comfortable with terms like “stay-at-home”, “shelter-in-place” and “self-quarantine”. All of a sudden, businesses which seek to excise their free rights under the constitution of these United States of America have found that to do so at present in certain places grants them the greeting of armed officers who remove them from their workplace by force.

I’d like to pause for a moment and let that sink in… By force. Just a month ago, such actions would have been met by uproar! The public outcry against a private business being closed by public officers would have been tremendous. It doesn’t have to be the National Guard or the military when many of our own policemen have shown themselves to be corrupt over the years. Instead of modeling a pattern of justly upholding the law, many have used and abused those laws, along with the people they are meant to protect. There have been countless examples, so many that were I to list them all it would flood this post with link after link and drive you mad if you attempted to read through the whole lot.

And yet we cheered. Sentiments like “close down the ass-clown” and “should’ve shot the bastard for risking the lives of his community” were expressed, among others, though those are perhaps the most hateful that I have personally heard thus far. This is just one story: another is of a man who refused to abide by the “recommended” quarantine and, as a result, he now sits inside his home, the outside of which is patrolled by armed policemen. All in the name of “safety & security”… and the stories continue to grow, day by day.

Perhaps these actions are necessary… (laughs!) I can’t even type that with sincerity. I was aligned with our Commander in Chief at the beginning of this whole ordeal when he downplayed the threat of the Coronavirus. No virus or even death itself will ever strike fear into my heart nearly as much as the sight of free men laying down their rights in the name of “safety” at the hands of their government.

“Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” – Benjamin Franklin

He was right. What benefit is safety and good health if it comes at the barrel of a gun? A weapon meant to protect the righteous from wickedness has now, in full view of all and with hearty agreement by many, been harnessed to oppress free people, and the majority does. not. care.

So I am afraid, and deeply, disturbingly so. I pray that I will be strong enough to stand firm against what I know comes next, unless by some miracle those in power should choose to relinquish the control they are so readily being granted. Are you truly ready to risk allowing your governors to hold such authority over you, even for a little while? To let them taste the bittersweet glee that comes from knowing what it is to hold the very freedom of their people in their hands? Because let’s face it… “absolute power corrupts; absolutely.” – Sir John Dalberg-Acton

Until recently, most Americans agreed with that statement, and yet here we are, giving up our freedoms so that we can be safe. Many of those who now sit without jobs are even waiting on what is perhaps the most terrible thing of all… For their government to hand them a check that will make everything alright, ease their financial burdens and allow them to live safely in their homes. The trade-off is to be sequestered, isolated and bereft of basic human rights.

So I must ask: are you afraid? Does the thought of the government being granted full authority over your ability to leave your home strike you with that cold sense of dread? If not, you are a fool, one who is blind and desperately needs his eyes open to the truth. Wake up, America! You are being duped, have been for many years, in fact, all in the name of safety and security, neither of which you will truly possess if you so readily release them to your governing bodies! May the like-minded be ready to stand firm, to rise against what’s coming, because mark my words, and hearken to them well… I would rather be seen a fool who is over-prepared and whose speech was proven nonsense later than caught by those militant hands and forced back into my home until I acquiesced and bowed to whatever god they said I must worship to survive. That, dear reader, is indeed a fate far worse than death.

Copyright © 2020 D.M. Kurtz