Quarantine Day 13: Marshal Law – So It Begins

Gateway to Anarchy

It was bound to happen, in fact my previous work in pandemic modeling predicted it would happen as one of the gateways toward anarchy. That it happened on day 13 of quarantine is poetically ironic. It was announced this morning that Rhode Island, that tiny state that’s neither a rode nor an island, has mobilized their national guard to go door to door seeking out of staters. I call on the Rhode Island national guard to defy their repressive orders, which by the way you are constitutionally obligated to do. Be men and women of liberty and justice above being subservient underlings of a panic stricken governor (ref. Crisis of Conscience post from 3/26).

What’s happened, in case you haven’t heard, is that the Rhode Island military, in the execution of their marshal law edict, are seeking American citizens who’ve fled New York to seek sanctuary on the island of isolation. If these were normal times, I would channel my inner Bill Maher or SNL and mock the less fortunate as they have done for years by suggesting that from a purely pragmatic perspective, I get wanting to rid the island nation of New Yorkers as much as I get smart New Yorkers wanting to flee the irrational rule of their manic governor and mayor. I would however suggest to the Governor of Rhodes that you take a different tact, perhaps mandating as part of your Marshal Plan that all islanders serve nothing but local cuisine until the encroachers flee in the name of preserving their palates. 

But these aren’t normal times so I will suspend my temptation to embrace New York sarcasm and pursue a more serious tone: this news out of Rhode Island is a shocking and a horribly dark turn in our nation’s response to a situation that’s yet to bloom into a full blown crisis. Remember I warned you in earlier posts what could and would happen when politicians become frightened and consumed within their recursive panic. This is a step into an abyss that might not have a return. How long I now wonder, before the New Mexico governor follows suite and bans my blog in the name of public safety?

Along the way to what increasingly seems like an inevitable slip into anarchy, marshal law was always the gate we should have dreaded passing through. There will be push back, which will be followed by even more draconian measures, which will inevitably be followed by even stiffer resolve from free thinking people willing to fight for liberty. From there it’s a rather short pasture ride to the point of no return.

My question for the island nation of Rhodes is once you’ve rounded up the vermin encroachers, will  you intern them like we did the Japanese in WWII? Equally prescient is what constitutes an encroacher and how is that different from a squatter? Where do the homeless fit into your drive for purity and if you’re rounding up less desirables, what role do drug addicts, people on welfare, folks with compromised immune systems, and the infirmed play? It is indeed a slippery slope you’re on, one that Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, and Hitler trail blazed on your behalf.

Message for My Governor

Hey Michelle, I implore you not to follow in Rhode Island’s footsteps, that is not the way to win the audition to become Biden’s running mate. Also, as an FYI, I will be riding my bike from White Rock to Los Alamos this afternoon along one of the four possible paths in case you want to tip off the COVID police. Hint: I will be traversing the path usually not permissible during normal times.