The Author

There simply is no target audience for propaganda of the below nature. Anyone who “needs convincing” is aware of the Israeli study finding natural immunity 27-times as effective at preventing symptomatic COVID-19 compared to the Pfizer vaccine. Further, the notion that antibodies targeting one particular element of a virus would be more effective than antibodies created to fight the virus in its entirety does not pass the smell test.

So why bother? Well, whether the propaganda convinces anyone or not becomes irrelevant when the policymakers have already built in an assumption that the propaganda will work. It’s a part of the machine; it just happens to be a part that, when broken, doesn’t immediately stop the machine, but rather causes the machine to slowly break apart.

Democrats generate a new authoritarian policy goal
Twitter runs propaganda in support of this new policy
The propaganda convinces no one
Democrat leaders assume the propaganda is working
Democrats enact their authoritarian agenda, overestimating its propaganda-driven popularity

What does this mean in real terms? There is no item in the Authoritarian’s Handbook stating that your persecution needs to be popular. President Biden’s approval rating can continue to tumble and people can continue to march in the streets, and the policies won’t be erased. So the massive disconnect in the Democrats’ perception of the authoritarian agenda’s popularity vs. its real popularity may appeal to the following:

1) Biden’s “compassionate side” (hello – are you in there? You are eradicating thousands of people’s livelihoods)

2) The emotional judges – this is where Black Lives Matter is critical

3) The midterms

Republicans have naively projected their purported respect for liberty onto an opponent that openly mocks it – could this have been avoided?

Liberty is not absolute. There is general consensus on vast restrictions regarding matters affecting the safety of those around us; we do not allow 12-year-olds to drive, and we do not allow unlicensed architects to design our homes. The correct policy prescription for any public safety matter must be guided by three key variables – intensity of the safety risk, effectiveness of the solution, and cost of the solution. Policymakers who do not respect liberty for liberty itself will always sacrifice it when these three variables even mildly align. But even those who do respect liberty for liberty itself will consider diminishing it in extreme circumstances. Republicans, as the lone defenders of liberty in this country, failed to sufficiently poke holes in all three of these variables; Republicans publicly painted COVID-19 and the spike-based vaccines as a winning combination for the destruction of liberty, creating a scenario in which the ruling party, inherently opposed to liberty, could arrive at a dramatically different policy prescription than the opposition party, inherently in favor of liberty, despite both parties taking extraordinarily similar public stances on the three key variables.

Safety Risk

President Trump was heavily invested in the diminishment of the safety risk of COVID-19, not due to a lack of public health risk, but due to the risk COVID-19 posed to the economy, the strength of which would be Trump’s primary pillar for re-election. President Trump was attacked for this stance, as were his allies. The emotional nature of these attacks, focused on the false choice of public health vs. the economy, created substantial peril for any Republican seeking to align with the President. Thus, most Republican leaders defaulted to the inverse – COVID-19 was an existential health crisis for which very few measures may be considered excessive. COVID-19 was cemented as the most intense public health matter we face, with zero substantial challengers – beyond the politically-toxic president – to this premise.

Republican leaders sacrificed objectivity on the dangers of COVID-19 in order to avoid public scorn. The first key variable – intensity of the public health risk – had locked into place, and Republicans would no longer have the credibility to reverse this course. Republican leaders falsely assumed their public stance on the pandemic, aimed at pacifying the media, would eventually lose out to their private one (also the predominant stance of their constituents). However, without any prominent, credible Republican planting seeds of doubt regarding the intensity of this public health risk, the legend of COVID-19 could grow uninterrupted. Republicans had failed to slay the beast in its infancy, and the town would now be consumed.

Republicans treated COVID-19 like smallpox in public, and like the flu in private.

Effectiveness of the Solution

Everyone knows what I’m about to say, so let’s cut to the chase:

Republicans treated the COVID-19 vaccines like the smallpox vaccine in public, and like the flu shot in private.

Cost of the Solution

Again, let’s skip ahead:

Republicans treated the side effects of the COVID-19 vaccines like the side effects of the flu shot in public, and in private – data missing.

Republicans failed to recognize that, as the opposition party, their job was not to play along with the narrative, but rather to resist the authoritarian left’s inclinations by diminishing the three key variables. Republicans facilitated a public stance toward COVID-19 that created substantial public support for the extreme measures we see today. Republicans failed to contrast COVID-19 with a disease that may reasonably justify these measures, and thus failed to establish the sliding scale of liberty, alienating and failing millions of their supporters.

Author: The Author

Republicans have Badly Misplayed the Sliding Scale of Liberty

Articles in the Docket