So far, only one political leader in Australia has had the guts, let alone even a lukewarm commitment to liberty, to announce a path to freedom for all – vaccinated or not.
As I recently wrote for Insight, at least the pandemic has shown me exactly who are the born bullies, bootlickers and snitches. More than anything, it’s shown clearly who in the political class can be trusted to uphold freedom.
The answer is, of course: none of them. Not one of Australia’s political leaders, federal or state, has exactly covered themselves in glory, now that the push of liberty has come to the shove of authoritarianism.
But some have at least performed better than others. If “Dictator Dan” or WA’s little Hitler, Mark McGowan, are the worst, NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian has at least shown herself to be the best of a very dismal bunch.
To be sure, Berejiklian has imposed much the same sort of useless, authoritarian lockdown and mask policies as other premiers but, to her credit, she delayed them as long as possible. Berejiklian is also throwing a sop to the vaxholes – for just a month. Then it’s equal rules for all.
Sydney’s lockdown is set to end for fully vaccinated residents on 11 October, the premier says, when 70% of the adult New South Wales population is expected to have received two doses of a Covid vaccine.
But even that will only last five weeks.
Gathering limits and indoor mask rules will be abandoned completely from 1 December.
The plan also outlined further relaxation of the rules for unvaccinated people from 1 December. The three-stage blueprint builds on the relaxed rules for 70% coverage, which is expected to be reached earlier than expected.
Berejiklian said she could “quite confidently envisage 11 October will be the day” that freedoms for 70% vaccination coverage were introduced, that date being the Monday after the target was likely reached. However, she avoided calling it “freedom day”.
Gotta keep the vaxholes happy and let them have their little bit of smug.
And even Berejiklian doesn’t have the political courage to stand up to the bullies of the public health troughacracy.
The third stage of reopening, to take effect from 1 December, does away with limits on in-home gatherings, and shifts to a density rule of one person per two square metres for outdoor and indoor settings, including hospitality, retail, entertainment and weddings. Masks will only be mandatory on public transport and planes, and for some hospitality workers.
The Guardian
Naturally, the vaxholes, in the mainstream media especially, are furious.
The Daily Mail ranted that “the NSW premier betrayed those who did the right thing by announcing that on December 1, when 90 per cent of the state will be immunised, the unvaccinated would have the same freedom as them”.
Segregationists haven’t been this angry since Eisenhower forced them to let “coloreds” into their schools.
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