Killing Us Not So Softly with Their Lies

 

As Texas Governor Greg Abbott plays to his ultra-conservative, gerrymandered-into-control base, he appears to be turning Texas into an evangelical theocracy where women do not control their bodies and defying science is publicly accepted. Even as COVID infection and mortality numbers remain high. With their heartbeat, bounty-hunter-enforced abortion law currently in effect, and the new Abbott executive order banning anyone in the state from enforcing vaccine mandates, in defiance of a federal order to the contrary, Texas has become a religion-determined state, notwithstanding a longstanding First Amendment ban on state-sponsored religion. Major federal vendors, like American and Southwest Airlines are defying his vaccine order, citing federal preemption over state laws.

Abbott, who faces reelection in 2022, is watching ever more radically right-wing primary candidates gather to unseat Abbott, whose failures during the winter collapse of the Texas power grid have pushed him to embrace ultra-right-wing policies to distract from his obvious incompetence at the helm. 

It's as if vaccine mandates are something new. Not quite the truth; we’ve been living with vaccine mandates in the United States for over two centuries. “America had many years of experience with vaccinations. The Puritans provided for vaccinations against smallpox after an outbreak devastated New England. But immunizations weren’t required anywhere in the United States until 1809, when Boston imposed mandatory vaccination to quell recurring outbreaks of smallpox that patchy, voluntary vaccination was permitting. Subsequently, some states adopted similar legislation…

“In 1905 the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in favor of the state against [anti-vaxxer] Jacobson; the Court having found that an immunization rate of 85-90 percent confers protection on the entire group. The landmark Supreme Court case Jacobson v Massachusetts served as the precedent for future court decisions and the foundation of public health laws.

“The Supreme Court considered the ordinance again in 1922 when some objected to the requirement that school children be vaccinated. Once again, the principle of mandatory vaccination was upheld. By 1969 compulsory immunization laws in twelve states—Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Rhode Island, Tennessee, and West Virginia—had expanded to include smallpox, measles, poliomyelitis, diphtheria, pertussis, and tetanus.” History News Network (3/18/15). Today, pre-public school enrollment vaccinations are standard across the land. 

But there is now a growing trend in red states, where religious and ultra-conservative forces are pledged to push the clock way back in time, some willing to condone violence to enforce their minority views, to suppress contrary information, censor unpleasant truths (the anti- “cancel culture” and “critical race theory movement), force a distinct and very vocal minority to govern at the expense of democracy and the Constitution, negate elections where their GOP candidate loses and to impose religious beliefs on individuals who do not share those beliefs. 

Denial of what was clearly recorded and reported on mass media everywhere, resulting in arrests and indictments of over 600 participants with many already pleading guilty – the January 6th Capitol insurrection – is very real. It was not, as so many elected Republicans claim, a group of tourists. It was not a mere exercise of free speech. It was an attempted overthrow of the election and, as a result, the government of the United States of America.

That a killer virus has, likewise, morphed into a polarizing political force is tragic. Over 700,000 Americans have died from the disease. And yet, red state governors are not only banning vaccine mandates, which includes nursing homes, schools and public transportation, but fining and defunding those willing to treat the disease as real and controllable through vaccine mandates. Successful containment statistics in blue states support the effectiveness of such mandates.

Florida’s rogue governor, Ron DeSantis, also catering to that same religious base, has taken to enforcing Florida’s ban on vaccine mandates with fines against even governmental entities: “The county government that is home to Florida’s capital was fined $3.5 million Tuesday by state health officials for requiring its employees to get COVID-19 vaccines and for firing 14 workers who failed to get the shots.

“The Florida Department of Health issued the fine for Leon County, saying the municipality violated Florida’s ‘vaccine passport’ law, which prohibits businesses and governments from requiring people to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination… ‘These are people that, presumably, have been serving throughout this whole time and now all of a sudden they’re basically getting kicked to the curb,’ Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said at a news conference in St. Petersburg Beach. Later, the governor tweeted, ‘No one should lose their jobs because of COVID shots.’

“The law took effect last month and can result in a $5,000 fine per violation. It is being challenged in court and conflicts with a Biden administration order that companies with more than 100 employees require their workers to be vaccinated or face weekly testing.

“In a statement, Leon County Administrator Vincent Long said he was made aware of the fine through media reports… ‘There is a genuine disagreement about the applicability of the statute and rule, and the county will enforce its rights using any remedies available at law, if necessary,’ Long said.” Associated Press, October 13th. Somehow, the right to infect others is now a GOP platform that defies logic. As our economy continues to stagger under the threat of the Delta virus variant, as statistics clearly prove that vaccine and mask mandates work where applied, Republican candidates continue to defy science, logic, common sense, statistical proof and medical risks with this politization of a disease.

I’m Peter Dekom, and this powerful nation-killing and disease-spreading Republican set of doctrines remains incomprehensibly self-destructive.