Category Archives: Freedom

Gov. Roy Cooper is poised to give North Carolina its economic freedom, but with that comes much more.

Cooper announced Wednesday that the state will move toward Phase 2 of the reopening schedule he set out last month. North Carolina restaurants, swimming pools and beauty salons will be allowed to operate at 50 percent capacity beginning Friday, but bars, nightclubs, fitness centers, gyms and bowling alleys will remain closed.

Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Mandy Cohen called it a more modest step than we would have originally planned. Cooper called it another careful step forward. Its also a politically sound and economically sensible decision for the governor. But like so much with COVID-19, theres no way to know if moving toward Phase 2 is a safe step or a leap too soon.

This much is certain: Its up to North Carolinians now. The governors decision was not only about trying to revive a staggering economy. It was about shifting the responsibility of COVID-19 from the government to the people it serves.

Thats a politically sound path to take. While Cooper was in the mainstream when he first announced coronavirus restrictions, hes been among the slowest to move his state out. That caution was warranted, but its led to a steady drip of complaints from Republican leaders, as well as impatience among business owners and fatigue from people who want to make their own decisions. With COVID-19 numbers mostly leveling out or declining, it was time politically and economically to let that happen to a greater degree.

The decision also fits the ideological sensibilities of his state, which has long bristled at the heavy hand of government. While people overwhelmingly understood the need for initial measures to slow the spread of COVID-19, there was growing resistance to one-size-fits-all restrictions. North Carolinians wanted more choice.

What will that choice look like? If youre among a vulnerable population or live in a COVID-19 hot spot or just think the inside of a restaurant is still too risky, you can continue to avoid all the things the governor forbid until now. If youre ready to mingle with the masses, you can do so we hope at a safe social distance.

With that comes risk. Most businesses and retail stores will take measures to protect employees and customers, as thoughtful owners and managers always have. But some stores and companies will not. When businesses are left to their own devices, they sometimes cut corners and skirt the rules, because they think no one will get hurt.

That could be catastrophic with COVID-19, resulting in an infection regression that risks public health and economic damage. Cooper and county officials need to be vigilant about coronavirus violators, including businesses that decide to ignore the governors 50-percent capacity rules.

Cooper also needs to be ready to be wrong about Phase 2. If a new COVID-19 spike follows in parts of North Carolina, hell be faced with the exceedingly hard call to move backward, not forward, with the reopening. We hope that doesnt happen, but some of N.C.s coronavirus numbers have ticked up in recent days, and states like Texas and Georgia hinted at a potential new COVID-19 surge a couple of weeks after making moves to reopen. Its too early to know what reopening means in those states and ours, but the governor cant say there werent warning signs.

For now, however, North Carolina is getting more of the freedom many wanted. Our health and our economy are in our own hands now.

The rest is here:

Opinion | The governor is giving NC its COVID-19 freedom. What will that look like? - Richmond County Daily Journal

For, paraphrasing Immanuel Kant, no dignity can possibly exist without a public realm, but only price and servitude; if you cannot afford it, bad luck, because you will be left to die. Nor should you think yourself fortunate if, through a charitable donation, those who consider themselves masters and the fat cats pretend to save your life, because you are to live if you happen to save yourself with your servitude intensified and they with their domination recognised.

Why is the Right, i.e. the political forces which represent and defend the bourgeoisie, and the oligarchic strata with an even greater determination, so nervous and agitated (e.g. in Spain), and why is it so shaky and zigzagging after having boasted to subdue, or at least bully, the world (as is the case in the UK)?

The reason is that the Right has bumped into a real problem, namely, that the coronavirus pandemic has suddenly dissipated the smokescreens which usually pervade normal times, and has forced practically everybody to see and live in their own flesh the deathly consequences of the criminal politics the same Right has carried out against public health and public services, especially over the last ten years.

Furthermore, the pandemic compels almost everyone to truly realise, at least for a moment, about the absolutely vital importance of the public realm (including public services), that is, of that which belongs to everyone, in exactly the same measure and without exception indeed being self-constituted and not granted (by whom?), it is the nemesis of any kind of concession or donation. In other words, the existence and the very meaning of the public realm lie precisely in the guarantee it provides that no one, either individual or institution, will arrogate the power to grant or deny any portion of what is common that common which constitutes us as society to anyone.

This is the crucial point: the flash that reveals the unquestionable value of the public realm. It is also the best moment to underscore the fact that capitalism is not in crisis the world is, a world whose tragic fate seems to be that it cant be imagined otherwise than as a capitalist world. Indeed, the world may be falling apart, but capitalism continues to be open for business as usual, and profiteering and profiting more than usual.

We cannot pretend to be surprised, let alone shocked, to see that hedge funds [are] raking in billions during coronavirus crisis, or that the private firm running UK PPE stockpile was sold in middle of pandemic, or that hedge funds and Brexit supporter hedgies determine crucial aspects of the means to control the pandemic, and so on and on and on no surprise then, although I do reckon the unavoidable half-smile breaking through our faces when those servants of domination whose business is to defend capitalist practices regardless offer us headlines like this, hedge fund kings betting against our firms, as though there could be an our for capitalism other than in the well-known forms of exclusionary, classist, racist, misogynist in brief, criminal our.

It is the capitalist bourgeoisie, or rather oligarchy, which, despite the appearances (Americas super-rich see their wealth rise by $282 billion in three weeks of pandemic), has a cold, although a considerably annoying and potentially dangerous one should that possibility hinted at by the pandemic become articulated into a clear political disjunction between, on one side, the public realm and the mutual solidarity, fraternity and sorority that constitute it, and, on the other, alms or charitable donations and all they imply in terms of domination, brutal inequalities and foolish individualism.

This is a real contradiction, for a public realm, that is to say, the existence of a central aspect of social life which is ruled by principles and values, is the very nemesis of capitalism and what the capitalist logic does not tolerate. We will see in a moment that it is also what the capitalist oligarchies, chief carriers of that logic, are bent on destroying and appropriating, including at the level of an incipient global public realm to fight against the pandemic, as this shows: push against global patent pool for Covid-19 drugs.

It remains to be seen whether the massive popular support for the NHS as a public health system, and more generally for public services, will be articulated into an effective political force able to reclaim the public realm and institute some basic principles of collective life. What is certain is that this can hardly happen if there is no clarity about the current political conjuncture and orientation about how to act in it.

This article is a contribution to that labour of clarification and orientation, and this precisely in a moment when the Right and its lethal wealth defence industry are working hard to cover up, obscure, obfuscate and disorient. The task that emancipatory (or progressive, if you want) political forces have to confront requires them not only to sustain the flash revealing the decisive import of the public realm, but make people see the absolutely imperative necessity of taking a further step, the decisive one, and defend it actively as the most precious treasure of collective life, at least of a dignified collective life, in the Kantian sense of dignity, as reads the epigraph at the beginning of this article.

This is the only alternative, there is no other. But it can be said in different ways: Either dignity, or charity. And also: Either freedom, or servitude. We have to take sides, indeed everyone will take sides, whether we want it or not, for not taking sides amounts to taking the side of the powers in place, that is, of domination, and therefore of servitude. It goes without saying that the oligarchy and the political forces at its service have their side clear, in truth they do not need to take it because they are already there, they have always been there.

In other words: the Right needs not even think about this because it acts by instinct: the instinct of the owner who becomes at once convinced that possessing wealth and money is an automatic qualification for human excellence and for domination indeed, they go to enormous lengths to have this recognised, to the point of calling freedom the blatant assertion of the flurry of whims, appetites and desires that wealth unleashes, but this is obviously a big misnomer for something whose proper and only name is oligarchic instinct. This instinct is a full-fledged subjective disposition which, as Marx shows in his analyses of class struggles in times almost as thickly oligarchic as ours, is not a mere effect of the structure of the world but is itself a powerful maker of the world. The latest historical articulation of that instinct, the one suitable for capitalism and the capitalist oligarchy, was provided by the doctrine called with a certain exaggeration liberal for liberal it is, but only with capital, so we have here a second, closely related, misnomer.

Now, of the two sides of the liberal doctrine, let us start with the donations because they may be deceptive, while the appropriations, which we will address in a moment, are in principle straightforward. Of course, all oligarchs are liberals. Contrary to what we often hear, there are no bad (e.g. libertarian) and good (liberal) oligarchs, they are all of the same kind and the differences between them are only of degree. The central importance of charitable donations to maintain domination can be gathered by the bustle we are observing during the lockdown, with several donations announced urbi et orbi practically on a daily basis, and news outlets describing all the details (who, how much, to whom) and providing large lists of donors, there are even billionaire trackers.

Of course, billionaires very theatrically donate a fraction of what they used to give back in taxes, making sure to generate maximum publicity for their actions. This is certainly true. And yet, important as this may be, the point is not about how much the oligarchs donate, or about how loudly they blow (or rather have others blow) their own trumpet, nor is it about how generous they are, and this not only because poor people as is well-known donate infinitely more than the rich in relation to what they have, but because generosity is totally at odds with the logic on which voluntary and charitable donations are inscribed but to explain that logic in all its lethal simplicity, something that is rarely done, we need to return to Adam Smith, the father of the modern liberal regime.

Originally posted here:

Pandemic politics, oligarchic times and the idiotic subject of 'freedom' - Open Democracy

Iveta Cherneva, a Bulgarian author who writes about security, politics, human rights, and sustainability, and a EURACTIV contributor, has been shortlisted for the position of the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of speech.

EURACTIVs Georgi Gotev talked to her about her plans.

How can an organisation such as the UN, where China and Russia sit in the Security Council, have a meaningful role in promoting freedom of speech?

The future UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of speech is not selected by the UN Security Council. In fact, the UN Security Council has nothing to do with the selection of the UN Special Procedures. The process on the selection of the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of speech involves multiple screening and selection stages which include the staff of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Consultative Group of the UN Human Rights Council, the President of the UN Human Rights Council, and then the 47 member states of the UN Human Rights Council who will vote on the appointment. We are really talking about a multi-layer, multi-player process here.

Bulgaria ranks 111th in terms of media freedom, according to the World Press Freedom Index by Reporters without borders. Is this a handicap for you or perhaps not, I mean a candidate from the countries ranking first or second, like Norway and Finland, would be less acceptable?

Yes, Bulgaria is on 111th place in the recent Reporters Without Borders ranking. Of course, when selecting and evaluating the future Special Rapporteur on freedom of speech nationality will play a role.

First, because the UN Special Procedures seek diversity and representation, and never in history has there been a UN Special Rapporteur from Bulgaria, on any human rights issue. Bulgaria is not only an underrepresented country, it is a never-represented country.

Secondly, the reason why nationality is important is due to the fact that a Special Rapporteur has to be ready to respond directly to challenges to freedom of speech. It makes sense to have a candidate who comes exactly from a country dealing with the specific human rights issue, a candidate like me who has been an open advocate for media freedom in Bulgaria and one of the vocal leaders of the anti-corruption protests of 2013 which marked history.

Do you know who the other candidates are, and who do you think are your strongest competitors? Are there other candidates shortlisted from EU countries?

The long list of finalists contains 50 names which are already publically available. The top 5 candidate list, however, that I belong to, is not publically known. So I know that there are at least four other excellent candidates for the role. The first hearing for the post took place on Tuesday (19 May) with the Consultative Group of the UN Human Rights Council.

Are you an official candidate of Bulgaria or did you apply independently?

I did write to the Bulgarian Mission in Geneva and the Bulgarian Ambassador to the UN in Geneva to seek support for my candidacy for the UN Special Procedures but I did not hear back. Therefore, there is no government that stands behind me. I am a fully independent candidate and I will always be. I will serve no government, and I will spare no government, should I be selected as the next UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of speech.

Generally, support from a government is not necessary in order to be nominated and considered. Now, of course, governmental support, on the whole, is a key to being selected, approved and voted in because the UN Human Rights Council consists of member states.

Both governmental support and governmental opposition can help or harm a candidate. Governmental support is not everything in the process. Governmental support can really go either way. Lack of support from a certain government, for example, can also tell a lot. In fact, opposition from a certain government speaks volumes to the Consultative Group.

Tell us more about yourself.

I was a part of history in the making growing up as a little girl in Bulgaria. I lived in a society which realised what the difference is when Freedom of Speech was not there and when she came back.

The UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of speech needs to be the full package. He or she needs to wear several hats at the same time and this is something that the Consultative Group is aware of.

I combine several aspects necessary for the role of a UN Special Rapporteur. I have the legal and academic knowledge of human rights. I have the political element having worked with various political actors on human rights. I have that activist angle and experience, but also I got down the media aspect with my various media appearances, articles and opinions over the past decade. Last but not least, my career at the UN with five different agencies adds another layer of my candidacy. I have worked in the UN human rights system so now I am ready to take it to the next level to become the top global expert on freedom of speech, which is one of the most scrutinized and potentially explosive mandates really.

Finally, in terms of who I am as a person, I will quote one of my favourite rappers, G-Eazy: If I ever said Im never scared, just know I mean it.

[Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic]

See original here:

UN freedom of speech rapporteur must wear several hats, says Bulgarian candidate - EURACTIV

Indonesia has recently indicated it is considering investigating the killings of hundreds of thousands of people in the 1965 anti-communist purge under authoritarian leader Soeharto.

If the inquiry goes ahead, it would mark a shift in the governments long-standing failure to address past atrocities. It is unclear if they will include other acts of brutality alleged to have been committed by the Indonesian regime in the troubled region of West Papua.

According to Amnesty International, at least 100,000 West Papuans have been killed since the Indonesian takeover of West Papua in the 1960s.

While the number of killings peaked in the 1970s, they are rising again due to renewed activism for independence in the territory. In September 2019, as many as 41 people were killed in clashes with security forces and Jihadi-inspired militia.

Clashes between security forces and the West Papua National Liberation Army have escalated since January, which human rights groups say have resulted in at least five deaths. At least two other civilians were killed in another incident.

The latest violence was sparked by racial attacks on Papuan university students in Java last year, which prompted thousands of Papuans to protest against the government. The protests brought renewed media attention to human rights violations in the region and Papuans decades-long fight for autonomy.

However, because the international media have been prohibited from entering West Papua, the broader conflict has received relatively little attention from the outside world. (This weeks feature by ABCs Foreign Correspondent program in Australia was a rare exception.)

New project to map past atrocities

Late last year, we embarked on a project to map the violence that has occurred in West Papua under Indonesian occupation.

This was in part inspired by the massacre mapping project of Indigenous people in Australia by the Guardian and University of Newcastle, and the Public Interest Advocacy Centres mapping of violence in Sri Lanka.

Our aim was to bring renewed attention to the protracted crisis in West Papua. We hope that by showing the extent of state-sanctioned violence going back decades, we might encourage the kind of international scrutiny that eventually led to intervention in East Timor.

The map only documents some of the massacres that have taken place in West Papua since the 1970s, as conditions in the territory make it difficult to accurately record and verify deaths. The challenges include a lack of resources for record-keeping, internal displacement and frequently destroyed properties, and a fear of reporting deaths. Others have disappeared, and their bodies have never been found.

We also encountered a relative dearth of data from the 1990s to 2010s, in part due to few journalists reporting on incidents during this period.

For the purposes of our project, we relied largely on reportage from the Asian Human Rights Commission and the International Coalition for Papua (both of which have strong connections within West Papua), as well as research by the historian Robin Osborne, Papuan rights organisation ELSHAM, Indonesian human rights watchdog TAPOL and a comprehensive report by academics at Yale Law School published in 2004.

Among the most recent attacks is the torture and murders of scores of protesters on Biak Island in 1998, according to a citizens tribunal held in Sydney. Some estimates say the death toll may have been as high as 200.

Though far from complete, our mapping project reveals several broad trends.

The government claims the National Human Rights Commission (Komnas HAM) is conducting inquiries into some of the more recent incidents, although there are concerns the body doesnt have sufficient powers and the government has previously been reluctant to accept findings of abuses.

Why has the world stayed silent?

Both Australia and New Zealand have been hesitant about intervening in human rights crises in the region, particularly when Indonesia is involved.

In 2006, Australia signed the Lombok Treaty, which assured Jakarta it would respect the sovereignty of the Indonesian state and not support separatist movements.

However, Australia and the rest of the world did finally act when it came to the independence referendum in East Timor.

In his memoir, former Prime Minister John Howard mentioned East Timor independence as one of his key achievements. However, in office, he showed very little appetite for supporting East Timor independence and ruffling Indonesias feathers.

It was largely the diplomatic intervention at the international level by US President Bill Clinton, alongside the deployment of Australian Federal Police (AFP) working as unarmed civilian police for the UN mission in East Timor, that eventually secured the referendum.

Media coverage played a critical role in persuading the world to take action. In West Papua, the media have not had the same effect.

This is in part due to what the Indonesian security forces learned from East Timor on how to control the media. The Indonesian government has frequently cut internet services in West Papua, enacted a complete ban on foreign journalists and denied requests from the UN Human Rights Commission to investigate human rights violations.

Despite this, mobile phone videos of abuse continue to leak out.

In the absence of extensive media coverage, Papuan pro-democracy advocates and their supporters have been calling for a UN-sanctioned human rights investigation. There is also significant support from human rights defenders in Indonesia for such an inquiry.

As it now has a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, Indonesia should fully support such a move. However, the military retains considerable influence in the country, and holding commanders suspected of human rights abuses to account remains politically difficult.

In fact, President Joko Widodo last year appointed as his new defense minister Prabowo Subianto, who himself has been accused of human rights abuses.

Given these challenges, what will it take for the world to show enough moral courage to force change in West Papua?

The right way forward is clear. As a member of the UN Human Rights Council, Indonesia needs to put an end to the media ban in West Papuan, support an independent UN investigation and hold accountable those responsible within the government for violent acts.

If Indonesia does not take this course of action, then diplomatic pressure from the world will be required.

---

Camellia Webb-Gannon, Lecturer, University of Wollongong; Jaime Swift, DPhil (PhD) candidate, University of Oxford; Michael Westaway, Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Archaeology, School of Social Science, The University of Queensland, and Nathan Wright, Research Fellow, The University of Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post.

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Fight for freedom: New research to map violence in the forgotten conflict in West Papua - Jakarta Post

Finding the right pizza can be tricky.

Once, all you needed to make was a decision between fairly run-of-the-mill offerings from a few small institutions. Now, the ever-burgeoning Abu Dhabi food scene means finding a slice of pie is no longer just a matter of a trip to Pizza Hut.

We've already set out our picks for the best slices of pizza in Dubai, so what about the capital?

Thankfully, you don't have to look far for a wood-fired pizza base or an authentic margherita in Abu Dhabi, either.

Whether you're after a tried-and-tested favourite (the pepperoni, the meat lovers or the Hawaiian) or something a bit different (a cauliflower base, vegan cheese or a dessert pie), we've got you covered.

Here are our six favourite places in Abu Dhabi to grab a slice.

For wood-fired, handcrafted pizzas, Sopranos is a must-visit. Located in Mushrif, this place is known for its metre-long pizza, but it also has an entire menu of ordinary-sized pies that are just as delicious, thanks to their deliciously tangy tomato bases and generously-laden toppings. The Mac creamy macaroni cheese topped with flaming hot Cheetos is a delicious (if decadent) addition to any order, as is the seriously indulgent Nutella pizza for dessert.

What to order: The vegetarian (Dh38), with onions, capsicums, mushrooms, tomatoes, black olives, garlic and Italian herbs, is a good pick for veggies looking to mix it up from a standard margherita.

Details: Airport Road, Mushrif, Abu Dhabi; 02 641 8182, http://www.sopranos.pizza

For fast delivery and a fantastic range of toppings, this little joint in Etihad Plaza does some of the best authentic Italian pizza in Abu Dhabi.

Choose from white or wholewheat dough with no additional charges. There's also pasta, salads and antipasti if you want to mix things up a little. If you're feeling indulgent, go for the paneer tikka pizza, which is like having an Indian takeaway on top of a slice of pie. Vegans will love the specialised menu with no fewer than seven different options, some with vegan cheese and other cheese-less pies.

What to order: The Fattoria (Dh58) with mozzarella, caramelised onions, sundried tomatoes, roast pine nuts and goats' cheese is a must-try.

Details: Etihad Plaza, Abu Dhabi; 02 885 3222, http://www.pizzadirocco.com

Cheap and cheerful never tasted so good. Like its straightforward name, this small Khalidiya joint delivers quick and delicious pizzas with minimal fuss. If you are looking for something fancy, this is not the place for you.

The ingredients used here are simple, tasty and old-school, such as mortadella, hot dog bits, tuna and minced beef. But, my goodness, can they take these simple items and make them sing on a pizza pan. A perfect accompaniment to a Netflix session.

What to order: The mortadella pizza (Dh20 to Dh30)

Details: Opposite Prince Palace Mobile, Near Fathima Supermarket, Al Khalidiya, Abu Dhabi, 02 633 3877

Who doesn't love pizza with a side of live entertainment? Even though it's off limits for now, with government restrictions in place due to the coronavirus, Jazz@PizzaExpress in The Mall at World Trade Centre is worth a visit once it reopens. For pizza lovers, the restaurant offers many options worth trying, including ones for vegans, meat lovers or health nuts (where pizzas are under 600 calories).

What to order: American Hottest (Dh76) is a must-try dish for those who enjoy a spicy kick. Made up of ingredients that include chilli, spicy turkey chorizo, and hot green and roquito peppers, the pizza lives up to its name.

Details: The Mall at World Trade Centre, Abu Dhabi, 02 444 7752 and Arc Tower, Abu Dhabi, 02 666 0068; http://www.pizzaexpress.ae

This is best for the calorie-conscious dough lover. Pinza isn't quite pizza, but also isn't a flatbread: the dough is made with more water than your average crust, and so promises fewer calories. It's crispy and crunchy with bubbles of air in the middle. Sure, it's not authentic Naples-style, but it is its own, delicious, sourdough-laced creation. It's probably the pizza we'd choose at lunch if we had a hankering.

What to order: there are five vegan options, which is uncommon on a pizza menu. The OMV (Dh60) comes with vegan chipotle sausage. Points for difference.

Details: Umm Al Emarat Park; 800 Pinza (74692); pinza.com

This is arguably the best pizza house for people with specialty diets. While there are plenty of meat and dairy-filled pies on the menu, there are also options for plant-based and gluten-free diners.

Opt for the cauliflower crust, for example, or choose to top it with vegan cheese or even the animal-free product Beyond Meat. These options come alongside a range of other gourmet toppings, such as truffle oil, goats' cheese, fennel seeds and beef chorizo. Get a regular pizza or go for Detroit-style, and add any of the myriad side dishes to that, from the healthy quinoa power salad to all-natural chicken tenders. There are a range of gluten-free and vegan desserts up for grabs, too.

What to order: The Free-gan (from Dh39). It's topped with orange bell peppers, caramelised onions, jalapenos, onions, cherry tomatoes, coriander, vegan cheese and red sauce.

Details: Khalidiya, Abu Dhabi, 02 641 0029; http://www.freedompizza.ae

Updated: May 24, 2020 04:19 PM

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Six of the best pizzas in Abu Dhabi: from Freedom to Khafayef Pastry - The National

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(This is one of the topics a whole book could be written about, but I will try to shrink it to blog post size.)

Skirmishers are well documented since antiquity. Their contributions were likely overlooked by many contemporary authors because skirmishers had no high social standing. This is similar to how some authors pretended that medieval battles were just a class of a couple hundred or thousand knights each, when typically each knight represented a "lance" (a small group comprised by the knight and his followers).

The Roman Republic divided its citizens by their wealth (income) and the poorest ended up serving in skirmisher units; mostly slingers and javelineers.

I have never found a mathematical way to express the dynamics of skirmishing in the Hellenic periods era in a useful way.

Parthian light (horse archer) cavalry practised a different kind of skirmishing. Their high value shock force (knight-like armoured lance cavalry) was best-used against hostile heavy infantry when it was not in good (closed) order. The light forces (light missile cavalry) thus attacked over and over again mainly to shape the battlefield for the shock forces. They injured, killed and despaired the enemy (Roman legionaries) to shape the battlefield for successful attacks by armoured lance cavalry.

I have not found a similar battlefield-shaping focus of skirmishing in Hellenic or Roman battles, though skirmishers always had the potential to entice an enemy into making an offensive move when it wouldn't prefer it otherwise.

Now fast forward to the 18th century and Napoleonic era. The skirmishers of this era were very different from antiquity. Moreover, the equipment of foot skirmishers of this era wasn't more lightweight than the equipment of line infantry. In fact, the Napoleonic era saw parts of the line infantry getting dispatched to serve as skirmishers. Skirmishing had become a tactic rather than an equipment issue.

The infantry of the era was employed in linear order (usually three ranks deep, but everything from two to six ranks were employed from late 17th century to Napoleonic era with three ranks being typical in the 2nd half of 18th century). This extreme discipline was rooted in an effort to maximise firepower with quick loading and firing when the blackpowder smoke of the previous salvo was gone. Such formations of hundreds of men in essentially 1.70 m by dozens of metres were easy targets even for inaccurate smoothbore muskets provided the shot wasn't from too far away (about 20% hit probability at about 230 m).

The effective firepower (excluding the human factor) of the troops can be described as

effective firepower = qty of men x rate of fire x dispersion factor x target size (shortest edge matters most, so width for a single man but height for a line)

Now let's look at smoothbore musket skirmishers vs. infantry line (a Peloton). For skirmishers, it's like

effective firepower skirmishers = poor x normal x normal x good

Their effectiveness was exclusively from the target size, for they were fewer and the gun technology was identical to their opponents'.

For the infantry line (a Peloton) this reads as

effective firepower Peloton = very good x normal x normal x poor

I suppose it's not really necessary to replace the variables with figures - the abstract level is already informative. It suggests that there was little reason to expect skirmishers to kill more than they would be killed. The fact that the line infantry stood behind each other actually gave them a better ratio of shots fired to target area than the skirmishers had.

There were three important factors in favour of the skirmishers: They could often exploit cover (such as stone walls between fields) better than the line infantry (which had to prefer line order over exploitation of cover) and the line infantry should not react with its full potential munition expenditure for the reasons mentioned before. The third factor was that the line infantry could not sustain its effective firepower as they formed a smoke wall in front of themselves and thus increased their own effective shot dispersion.

Skirmishing on other days than battle days offered additional promise: Such skirmishing would typically be ambush salvoes, then the skirmishers would break contact. This worked in America, but not so much in Europe where the desertion-prone armies of the cabinet wars (prior to French Revolution) had to avoid woodland to keep desertion rates low.**

Rifled guns with their better dispersion (but much slower loading) were an obvious way of giving skirmishers not only an edge against other skirmishers, but also against infantry lines. Rifles had such a combination of "rate of fire x dispersion factor" that they could skirmish from an almost safe (against musket fire) distance and skill be effective. Rifles' accuracy also allowed for picking targets, so the riflemen could aim at high value targets (officers, some NCOs, gun crews and flag bearers), albeit this was frowned upon in Europe.

Mounted skirmishing was similar; its main purpose was to entice the enemy into wasting shots and fouling its guns. Hussars and other mounted skirmishers used carbines (smaller calibre, shorter barrel, mostly to exclusively smoothbore). They offered a larger target (+horse, almost no ability to exploit cover) and less firepower (shorter barrel firearm) than dismounted skirmishers did and their skirmishing was not highly regarded in mid-18th century Europe. The increase of the share of rifled carbines*** in the late 18th century has apparently not changed this much.

Skirmishing isn't much of a component in modern-day tactics field manuals for infantry or mechanised forces, but there is some potential.

One potential is about attrition of the opposing force by using small and stealthy/elusive teams to provide targeting information (and possibly battle damage assessment) for artillery and mortar fires.

Another potential is about delaying actions; small and stealthy/elusive teams might use disproportionate firepower (including calls for indirect fires, but also ATGMs, sniping, organic mortars), mines and other obstacles to force the opposing force into deploying and using combat tactical movements (exploiting terrain features for concealment, making use of smoke and so on rather than simply quickly driving along roads) to mitigate the threat. This leads to some attrition, but possibly more importantly it slows the opposing forces down.****

Finally, there's one element of skirmishing that's actually in at least some modern army doctrines. The U.S. Army with its formalised force-on-force training events at the National Training Centre***** emphasised counterreconnaissance a lot in the 90's and early 2000's. This was in part a lesson from their mock battles******, which had a defined duration of a reconnaissance phase before the main forces were supposed to enter action. This artificial rule elevated reconnaissance and thus counterreconnaissance to prominence. There were no dedicated counterreconnaissance units, so it was in part about reconnaissance forces fighting each other. That's a similar situation to 18th century and Napoleonic skirmishers battling between the two armies' infantry lines, of course.

additional related external links:

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*: The fouling of the barrel was the main concern. An infantryman could have carried more than 60 cartridges and flintstones could quickly be exchanged with a screw mechanism after using up their durability of about 50 shots.

**: The more reliable (better pay, more comfortable job, less strict discipline, higher status) heavy cavalry provided security not only against hostiles, but also by guarding the own infantry against desertion as if the own infantry march column was a prisoner march column. They could not really do this in most woodland or swampland areas, of course.

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Defence and Freedom

Opening up America is about restoring the health of our society, not only about getting people back to work. A contact-tracing app, coupled with wider (though not universal) diagnostic testing, would enable more Americans to prudently go back to work, to school, and to ordinary life far more quickly than is now currently possible.

We argue here that the social benefits of an anonymized contact-tracing system are well worth the temporary privacy costs, but also that tracing must be mandatory in order to have the greatest likelihood of success in achieving the goal of opening up our economy and society. The details are important.

The ravages of the COVID-19 virus have forced nations all over the globe to curtail their citizens freedom of movement. The U.S. and its municipalities have been no exceptions. To combat the virus, people have been required to remain at home, to refrain from going to work or school, and to engage in the new process of social distancing. Never in American history has our freedom been so restricted.

We think most Americans agree that these restrictions on our freedom to move, to interact socially and to work have been necessary.

But now Americans look forward to when people can go back to work, when students can go back to school, and when restaurants, theaters and sports arenas can reopen. Those re-openings are not only necessary for our freedom but also for our economy and psychological well-being.

Unfortunately, winning that freedom and that return to economic vibrancy seems likely to require that as a society we submit to some other, lesser but unusual restrictions on our freedom and our privacy. These limitations will be necessary because in order to permit people to go back to work and mingle more, we need policies and mechanisms that will keep the number of infections at a low level.

At this time, America cannot rely on what is called herd immunity because not enough people have been exposed to the virus to cause that phenomenon, nor is it even certain at this point that people who have recovered from the infection cannot get re-infected.

Whether to submit to the lesser restrictions in favor of more fundamental freedoms is, except at the extreme, not a question of law. (The Fourth Amendment issue that has been raised is, in our view, a red herring.) It is a question of policy: whether we are willing to forego lesser freedoms in the short to medium run in order to regain more quickly and permanently our fundamental freedoms of movement, to earn a living, and to attend events and gatherings.

It is necessary to pose this tradeoff because if we simply assert that we are ready to be free and to go about our business, the virus very likely will return and we fairly quickly will be facing another round of quarantine and social distancing that would again curtail our economic and social activities. As Peggy Noonan opined in the April 18 Wall Street Journal, No opening of America will be sustained until its got right.

Seoul, South Korea is reopening for business. There even are people in the restaurants. Koreans ability to do this reportedly has been made possible through a combination of testing and contact-tracing apps. Kanga Kong has traced this story for Bloomberg.com. But as described in The New Yorker, the Korean system is very invasive, using a mix of smartphone apps, monitoring of credit card records, medical records and detailed, intrusive personal questioning. It is not an approach that we believe a majority of the American people (let alone Congress and the President) would accept.

We believe that a more advanced smartphone contact-tracing app, combined with testing and self-quarantine when necessary, would be less intrusive than the Korean system, at least as effective, and more politically palatable (though we admit not without difficulty).

Fortunately, a number of contact-tracing apps are reportedly in development: One by Apple and Google, another by researchers at MIT, as well as others in Europe. Aaron Carroll has written for the New York Times Upshot page about the joint work of the Center for American Progress and Dr. Ezekiel Emmanuels on contact tracing, while surveying other proposed solutions for tamping down the full-blown return of the virus once we were well on the other side of the current infection curve. Under any circumstances, Carroll concludes that re-opening likely will be very difficult.

David Leonhardt, also of the New York Times, has reported that Singapore, which has adopted many of the steps that experts have prescribed, nonetheless has imposed a new lockdown. That is a caution that the designers of any American program should heed.

In order to send people back to work and, eventually, to reopen restaurants, theaters, sports arenas, and most retail establishments, we are going to need a system that quickly identifies people who come down with the virus and all the people with whom they have had recent contact. Those who come down with the virus then can self-quarantine to prevent infecting others, and those who had been in close proximity can at least be vigilant as to developing any symptoms themselvesand perhaps should be taking even greater steps to protect others.

This kind of program requires a database and a notification system.

A vigorous testing regime to identify new cases also seems needed regardless of what other technology is used to track those who may be at risk. But given Americas needs and capabilities, it does not appear that fully sufficient testing for all Americans, or at least all American adults, will be ready for the foreseeable future.

In fact, to be as effective as some medical professionals have suggested, a massive testing system would have to be frequent, if not every day, then at least two or three times a week. That is because a test may reveal you to healthy on Monday though you could contract the virus a day or two later. Not only is testing capacity in America unlikely to handle such a large volume of tests any time soon if ever, frequent universal testing would be highly intrusive and still not fully effective for reasons we outline shortly.

Scott Gottlieb, former FDA Commissioner who is now back at AEI, has estimated that by fall America should be able to test 3 million per week, but that is months from now. Accordingly, the best that can be done is rigorous and frequent testing of front-line workers, especially our brave health care professionals, and testing designed to get at least a lot more people, currently deemed non-essential but now forced to sit at home, back to work, as Dr. Gottlieb has urged.

The limitations of testing as a silver bullet to the get-back-to-work challenge underscore the need for a supplemental, widespread contact-tracing system, coupled with quarantines of those who test positive.

The most cost-effective way to implement such a system is through a contact-tracing app, which uses individuals smartphones Bluetooth capabilities to detect when they are in the presence of another app-enabled smartphone and to send the identities of the smartphones that it has encountered to the central database. If the system receives a report that someone has contracted the virus, then each of the smartphones that have been in contact with that persons smartphone will be alerted to the possibility that their owners may become contagious in the next brief period of time. The exact mechanism that is used at that point is not the same in every system and is the subject of a great deal of ongoing work. The Apple-Google description of their proposed architecture provides one guide to how a system likely would work. The Financial Times published a good schematic April 20 that is useful as well.

The potential designs that we have read about would shield the identity of the people with whom any single smartphone had come into contact and would keep confidential the identity of the person who has contracted the virus. Individual identities would not be necessary for the system to do its work. According to their website, the proposed Google-Apple system incorporates these safeguards.

Building in anonymization should blunt legitimate privacy concerns about contact tracing. As the website Axios.com reported on April 17:

Consensus seems to be building globally around the idea that Bluetooth-based contact tracing could be a practical use of technology to contain the spread of the coronavirus.

Why it matters: Both governments and advocacy groups agree that using Bluetooth to sense the proximity of users phones could be more effective and less of a civil rights problem than tapping location-based data that apps and service providers often collect.

In freedom-loving America, it is likely that not enough people would voluntarily download and use the Google-Apple app or something equivalent, which of course would limit its effectiveness. That would be a tragedy because many more people will be able to regain their freedom of movement and to go back to work and play, secure in their safety, knowing that an effective smart-phone-based contact tracing system is in place.

As Liza Lin and Timothy W. Martin reported in the Wall Street Journal on April 15, Lawmakers are learning that voluntary contact-tracing apps that claim to preserve users privacy, such as the one proposed by Apple and Google, arent effective without high levels of participation.

But this surely will not happen so long as use of a smartphone system is voluntary. Lin and Martin noted that in Singapore, for example, only about one-fifth of the countrys 5. 6 million residents, have downloaded the governments TraceTogether app, even after health officials implored citizens to partake. The tally must rise by millions more to be effective, the government said.

It is clear, therefore, that contact tracing through smartphone apps cannot come anywhere close to being adequately effective unless and until their use is made mandatory. Whenever the danger is past, contact tracing can become voluntaryor even can be put in mothballs.

In the meantime, we favor a Congressional mandate of an app-based contact tracing system, with the app to be chosen by HHS as soon as practicable, meeting objective criteria, including anonymization. The Google-Apple app may be the winner in such a competition, though it is possible one of other systems now in development may come out on top.

We understand that most policy consideration of a contact-tracing regime has focused primarily on getting people back to work. But such a focus, while understandable, does not take account of how society functions. Workers do not go to restaurants, gatherings and sports events alone. They go together with people who do not work.

Moreover, creating a society where people who work are authorized to do things that other people are not authorized to do likely will lead to pushback that will tend to discredit and impede the mechanisms on which reopening relies.

To succeed, we need a system where every American gets a leg up. We need to see ourselves as in the fight and the reopening together, as one nation, with the same liberty and justice for all.

Regardless of whether a smartphone-based system is voluntary or mandatory, every American must have the opportunity to participate. Without that, no matter how good the program will be, it will exacerbate the inequalities that already separate our society.

That means that everyone must have access to a simple smartphone and to the internet. For years, we have seen countless studies and media reports about the digital divide and how it must be bridged if all Americans can fully participate in our economy and society. The divide has been closing but is still too wide. The COVID pandemic fundamentally changes the debate and underscores how not being plugged into the internet not only can deprive kids of their education (as schools have gone to remote learning during this pandemic) but is now actually essential for all of us.

Congress therefore should, as part of the contact-tracing system, adopt a program that guarantees at least basic models of smartphones and basic service plans to all Americans. Many people who have older phones also may need help to get a sufficiently modern phone. In India, that would be a high percentage of people, but in the U.S., it does not appear to be. Overall, approximately 81 percent of U.S. adults owned a smartphone in 2019.

Of course, furnishing phones and internet access to the less affluent will be costly, measured in billions of dollars initially and, to some extent, on an ongoing basis. Compared with what is at stake and huge economic costs of closing much of the U.S. economy, perhaps on an off-and-on basis for some while that cost would be modest and would generate the added benefit of giving less affluent Americans better access to our modern economy.

We recognize that any mandatory system must have an enforcement mechanism, though at the same time not one as intrusive as used by China or even South Korea.

Fortunately, an effective enforcement system need not be punitive in the first instance. One approach is to permit only those who comply with the app-based system to go to work, restaurants, theaters, and sporting events, while the pandemic emergency is in place. People would then be able to choose whether to take the minimal steps necessary to protect other people by adhering to the tracing app in order to qualify for these sorts of freedoms, or to forego the freedoms and not comply with the app.

There should be one exception to this quasi-voluntary system of enforcement. Legal penalties must exist for those who tamper with their smartphones to make them provide false positives to gatekeepers. By analogy, we dont permit people to tamper with smoke detectors in airplane bathrooms because doing so poses real threats to other passengers.

A universal smartphone contact-tracing system, while it is in place until an effective vaccine is developed and widely deployed, would enable periodic monitoring of individuals health. The precise content of that periodic monitoring has yet to be designed, but certainly it should include temperature monitoring and, for those who have been notified that they have been exposed, their pulse oximetry reading each day to signal worsening of their disease. The exact frequency of monitoring, however, should be decided by analyzing available data and might change from time to time based on current information. (Facebook has recently rolled out a county-specific map that tracks their users reported symptoms, but as helpful as this tool is for monitoring county-wide developments, it isnt granular enough for health care systems to alert specific individuals they need more aggressive care interventions).

Health surveys would also identify people who may have an incipient COVID-19 disease and therefore could recommend follow-up testing, which in turn could help to limit the number of tests that have to be conducted. The survey could be more intensive for people who had been identified as in contact with a person who has the virus.

Periodic health surveys during the pandemic emergency also could provide early detection of other diseases as well, which would bring greater efficiency to the healthcare system and, perhaps most importantly, better, more prompt healthcare to the less affluent.

Lost privacy is a serious challenge to a smartphone contact-tracing system even in an era when so many people seem to disclose their most intimate secrets on social media platforms. The ACLU, as one would expect, has expressed serious reservations about a contact-tracing app. Similar reservations have been reported in France, where contact tracing through smartphones is being discussed. Peter Swire of Georgia Tech has written thoughtfully about the privacy threats growing out of our national response to the 9-11 terrorist attack in Lawfare.

The Apple-Google app relies on anonymity for most privacy protections. But anonymity is, in practice, never absolute, and even anonymity will not completely prevent the danger of hackers.

The globally popular Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari has written one of the most compelling essays on the dangers of surveillance. Dr. Hararis excellent essay concretizes the legitimate concerns that many have voiced about using public surveillance system to deal with the Pandemic. Dr. Harari did not have the Apple-Google contact-tracing app specifically in mind (it had not yet been conceived when he published the cited article on March 20), but the dangers he wrote about do apply to that app, as well as to any other technological surveillance mechanism one might think of. Here are a couple of his well-phrased warnings:

Yet if we are not careful, the epidemic might nevertheless mark an important watershed in the history of surveillance. Not only because it might normalise the deployment of mass surveillance tools in countries that have so far rejected them, but even more so because it signifies a dramatic transition from over the skin to under the skin surveillance.

* * *

The downside is, of course, that this would give legitimacy to a terrifying new surveillance system.

* * *

You could, of course, make the case for biometric surveillance as a temporary measure taken during a state of emergency. It would go away once the emergency is over. But temporary measures have a nasty habit of outlasting emergencies, especially as there is always a new emergency lurking on the horizon.

The bottom line of such warnings is that when we use surveillance, we are always on the slippery slope toward Aldous Huxleys dystopian vision of Brave New World in which Big Brother is watching all of us all the time.

Hararis warnings raise serious issues. The line between enforcement and tyranny is a fine one. The line between data collection for the greater good and use of that data to suppress some or all of the population is, likewise, a fine one. Will government use the collected data to suppress, to mold or to alter public behavior in ways not necessary to combat the Pandemic? Will the data collection system become permanent based on some justification, such as better healthcare?

These questions cannot be answered with any certainty today. The questions must be kept in mind as the details of the system are worked out. And safeguards should be built in, though, realistically, such safeguards can never be perfect. The one minimum guardrail that is essential, and that directly responds to Hararis legitimate concern about the permanence of surveillance, is that any mandatory contact tracing system must have an automatic expiration date, such as three months after the FDA certifies at least one effective vaccine.

The fundamental fact is that all solutions to the current pandemic involve trade offs. Comprehensive, frequent testing even on a smaller and lesser scale is invasive, and so is contact tracing. The critical question is which combination of mechanisms will be the most effective in dealing with the present crisis with the minimum threat to our freedoms and privacy.

For the foreseeable future, we face a very deadly and hugely costly pandemic. We can elevate privacy or any other value to an absolute, but at our immediate peril. We believe that a time limited risk of privacy loss is a risk that most Americans will accept in order to avoid the very losses we will suffer if an effective system of mandatory contact tracing is not soon adopted

As former FDA Commissioner David Kessler wrote in the New York Times on April 20, we need a new social contract in order to deal with this pandemic. No man [read person] is an island, John Donne wrote in 1623. Americans need to digest the fact that people do not fight a pandemic individually; they fight it together; as a unit; as a society. And having digested that idea, we need to act accordingly.

Our modern society is lucky to have technologies and abilities that previous societies did not have to fight the diseases and plagues that afflicted them. We need to harness the innovation of tech perhaps even big tech to halt the spread of the disease so we can get the economy off the debt ventilator. If we want to have a modern world at all, we must use the power of technology to help to get us there.

The authors did not receive financial support from any firm or person for this article or from any firm or person with a financial or political interest in this article. Neither of the authors are currently an officer, director, or board member of any organization with a financial or political interest in this article.

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Freedom and privacy in the time of coronavirus - Brookings Institution

Published: 4/24/2020 12:01:33 AM

Modified: 4/24/2020 12:01:23 AM

To everything there is a season; this is the season to fight the virus. Are so many people really lacking in restraint and control that they cant help with stopping the spread?

This great county is founded on freedom and bravery. There are times when being brave and strong means restraining your freedom until the battle is over. Soldiers sacrifice their freedoms to train for battle and to fight for our freedom. We need to do the same. Soldier on and sacrifice a little. It will go a long way. Too many extremists: Far right, far left, absolute freedom or death, love them, hate them. Too many specialists: Good at buying and selling real estate, what else? Good at medicine, what else? Good at being a politician, what else?

Im looking forward to putting COVID-19 behind us or at least getting it under control. To quote Robert Heinlein: A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

MIKE PICHE

Henniker

Continued here:

Letter: Sometimes you have to restrain your freedom - Concord Monitor

Our 50 states can experiment with policy, as long as they stay within the constraints of the U.S. Constitution, their state constitutions and so on. This federalism allows state governments to find new solutions to emerging problems. Depending on the results, other states can then emulate, avoid or try a different version of a policy. This freedom to innovate creates healthy competition among the states for businesses and taxpayers. All of this state-by-state policy diversity is mostly a healthy thing as long as local governments dont infringe on a right thats specifically protected in the U.S. Bill of Rights.

The trouble is some states have behaved as if the Second Amendment is not even in the U.S. Constitution. The District of Columbia (D.C.) was so blatant about taking away this right that residents of D.C. decided to sue the District for violating their rights.That case, a dozen years ago, made it to the U.S. Supreme Court asDistrict of Columbia v. Heller. The high court ruled that the Second Amendment does indeed protect an individual right.This threw out D.C.s most-egregious restrictions, but it was hardly the end of the struggle for freedom in D.C., as the District continued to use other means to prevent people from utilizing their rights.

Soon after theHellerdecision, inMcDonald v. Chicago(2010), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment also restricts state and local governments. Still, though this helped, it didnt end many local infringements on this basic constitutional right.

As this was being written, the U.S. Supreme Court was considering another case (NYSRPA v.NYC) that could have a big impact on how the Second Amendment is treated by the state and local governments. Well let you know at A1F.com and in these pages what the Court decides. Potentially, this is a big deal, because for the past decade, the U.S. Supreme Court has turned down cases that would have allowed it to rein in the states and municipalities that continue to treat this constitutional right as if it can be regulated away into being a right in name only.

One problem with this is that an American citizen who wants to travel to a shooting competition, to a hunt, or just to bring a gun along for self-defense purposes has to wade through a lot of legal language to make certain they wont break any local restrictions. Thanks to lobbying from the NRA, there is federal protection in place for those who travel from one state or jurisdiction with a legally owned firearm to another place where they can legally have the firearm; nevertheless, a few states and cities have still arrested or detained law-abiding citizens as they traveled with firearms.

Americas complex legal patchwork of laws places an immense burden on individual gun owners. Making a mistake can lead to a felony conviction, lengthy jail time and a lifetime loss of a persons gun rights; as a result, we must know every law and be aware of the discretion local authorities have and how they use that discretion before we travel.

It shouldnt be this complicated. We should be able to carry firearms for personal protection around this great nation. The Second Amendment should be enough of a legal remedy to protect us as we do. One way to resolve this legalistic gauntlet is for Congress to pass, and for a president to sign, federal reciprocity legislation. To protect gun owners and allow people to universally exercise their fundamental rights, the NRA continues to lobby for such legislation.

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From The Editor: Barriers to Freedom - America's 1st Freedom

Erin Kokemiller, Iowa View contributor Published 9:47 a.m. CT April 24, 2020

Carlene Nelson, co-owner of Retreat Spa and Salon in Georgia demonstrated what safety measures she put in place as her business prepares to reopen. Augusta Chronicle

The government does not exist to save you and it cannot save you. It exists to ensure that we maintain our natural rights, but it cant shelter us from risks. If weve come to find comfort and safety in the governments regulation of liberty during this pandemic, we are headed for some unintended and very unpleasant consequences.

When we force businesses to close and people to stay home, we encounter two problems. First, we promote government as a saving power. The longer the shutdown, the more dependent we become on the government. The government becomes the provider of all our essential needs because we are not able to provide for ourselves.

Maybe youre someone who doesnt necessarily see a problem with that, but look at it this way: The more we depend on government, the more it has control over us. Do you really want the same government thatcant balance itsown budget to be in charge of yours?

The second problem of a government-mandated shutdown is that we easily forget the long-term consequences of our short-term behavior and policy. Weve all made rash and regretful decisions when we were panicking. Overwhelming emotion tends to make us shortsighted, but it doesnt mean our actions wont have unintended, long-term consequences. In times of panic, it is important to act quickly, yet mindfully. This pandemic will not be the only trial we face this year (as individuals or as a country). We shouldnt let our response to one threat make our citizens and nation so weak that we could not overcome another problem.

This is not to say that the U.S. should have continued business as usual. It makes sense that businesses who can be just as productive by having their employees work from home would do so. This is common sense but you cant legislate common sense. The problem here is that weve thrown personal responsibility and individual freedom out the window.

In a letter to James Madison, Thomas Jefferson used a Latin phrase that has a famous English translation: I prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery. Individual freedom means that my employer chooses for himself whether he stays open. It means I choose whether or not I want to take the risk and continue to work. Its easy for celebrities and millionaires to tell everybody to stay home theyre not at risk of losing housing or the ability to buy groceries. But if my employer has taken the risk to stay open and I find the risk of working to be less than the risk of not working, then I should be able to work. Likewise, I can choose if I want to physically go into a business or not. In this situation, no one is forcefully being put at risk and everyone gets to weigh the risks for themselves.

Lets not let the panic of this pandemic strip us of our freedom or cause us to neglect the long-term. Any liberty we give up will be hard to get back. The government cannot and will not save you from all harm thats your job.

Erin Kokemiller(Photo: Special to the Register)

Erin Kokemiller is an undergraduate economics student at Iowa State University from Boone.

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Yielding our freedom to the government is risky - Des Moines Register