Freedom Is Starting to Break Out

In Michigan, thousands of protesters against Governor Gretchen Whitmer’s notoriously excessive and inconsistent shutdown order thronged Lansing and brought traffic to a standstill. Ann Althouse comments on a report by the Washington Post that includes this short video:

The Post describes “President Trump flags, American flags and the occasional Confederate flag” at the protest–narrative above all, as usual. In the video, you see American flags everywhere. I noticed one Trump flag, no Confederate flags.

Ann comments:

Background on the strict and confusing order:

Confused shoppers found they could buy liquor and lottery tickets on a trip to the grocery store, but couldn’t visit the vegetable seed aisle or gardening center. The order required large stores to shut down plant nurseries and rope off sections where carpet, flooring and paint were sold, provisions that conservatives [Ed.: Only “conservatives”?] found both arbitrary and harmful to business owners.

It would be nice to consider the constructive things people might think of doing when they are confined to their homes. Paint and garden supplies would help people keep a positive outlook and also actually improve homes. If the Governor had observed and listened and tweaked the order when arguments about arbitrariness arose, she would not have been so vulnerable to these charges of “petty authoritarianism.”

Good point! I like this, from Virginia, turning a shopworn slogan to a more constructive purpose:

Here in Minnesota, there is a protest scheduled for noon tomorrow at the governor’s residence in St. Paul. I am not sure how big the crowd will be, as it hasn’t gotten a lot of publicity, but I will be there.

The authorities are responding. President Trump is, at this moment I believe, conducting an “Opening Up America Again” press conference. It’s all in the details, of course. Ohio’s governor has announced that his state’s shutdown will begin to end on May 1. North Dakota’s governor likewise has issued an order reopening that state on May 1. (When did North Dakota shut down? I didn’t think it had.) I have probably missed another state or two.

Pressure to stop devastating the lives of hundreds of millions of people will grow inexorably. Minnesota is a classic instance: our governor shut down the state on the basis of an alleged model that claimed 74,000 people would otherwise die–but only 50,000 with a shutdown! In fact, there have been fewer than 100 deaths, more than two-thirds in nursing homes and assisted living facilities. If our government had shut down access to nursing homes and assisted living facilities–which it didn’t effectively do, apparently–it would have saved more lives than the absurd cessation of economic and social activity that our feckless governor implemented. One more time: that’s noon tomorrow, at the governor’s mansion in St. Paul.

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