The narrative: The virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic was naturally occurring and policymakers and the medical establishment acted only out of concern for our health. The truth: Still largely unknown at this point, but there are growing reasons to believe that it’s not even remotely related to the narrative.
Almost every day the Story of COVID unravels, and we learn how much of it was a yarn used to tie us up in knots. Of all the narrative-changing reports that have surfaced, none illustrates this more than a weekend London Telegraph story, which reveals that former British Health Secretary Matt Hancock wanted to “deploy” a new COVID variant to “frighten the pants” off of “everyone with the new strain.”
We’re told that Hancock was discussing with an adviser the possibility that London Mayor Sadiq Khan would not be inclined to force harsh restrictions on Londoners over the 2020 Christmas season. Something, it seems, had to be done about this.
Adviser: “Rather than doing too much forward signaling, we can roll pitch with the new strain.”
Hancock: “We frighten the pants of everyone with the new strain.”
Adviser: “Yep, that’s what will get proper behavior change.”
Hancock: “When do we deploy the new variant?”
Turns out that it was the next day that Hancock announced there was a new strain on the loose.
There is a great deal to unbundle here. The public, not just in Great Britain but over the entire world, deserves to know if:
- Government authorities were prepping us for climate lockdowns or some other restrictions?
- What does “deploy” mean? That authorities had control over the virus and could manipulate it at will, or were Hancock and his adviser merely suggesting they overplay the seriousness of the new variant to terrify people? (Never let a good crisis go to waste.)
- Since it’s clear they knew the variant was in circulation, was the delay in announcing its existence an effort to milk it for as much as they could get out of it?
It’s deeply unethical for a government official to suggest that the public needs to be scared by the deployment of a new variant of a virus. It is also cruel and inhumane. And this happened in an ostensibly free and advanced society. Is there any reason to think those in power elsewhere didn’t employ the similar tactics?
It’s unfortunate but true that governments everywhere and at all levels attract the type of personality that experiences a sense of satisfaction from directing and controlling the lives of others. In its worst manifestations, the urge to dictate produced human history’s most murderous monsters. In its mildest from, it gives us the nosy neighbors and community busybodies we try to avoid. The many in between had their moment as czars and czarinas who put themselves in charge of others during the COVID pandemic. They had their grounds for acting as petty, and in some instances not-so-petty, tyrants.
Economist James M. Buchanan was right. Those with their hands gripping tight levers of governments do not, as a rule, act on behalf of the people they should be representing and serving. They act on behalf of themselves, the people be damned.
— Written by the I&I Editorial Board
