This is A Test

If you own a radio, a car, or don’t live in a cave where you have to rub twos ticks together to start a fire, at some point in your life, likely more than once, you’ve heard an annoying high pitched beep, followed by a monotone voice saying “this is a test of the emergency broadcast system. This is only a test.”

It happens infrequently, and if you’re lucky enough to be stuck in your car when they’re testing the system, you have to suffer through sixty odd seconds of a long beep, followed by the disclaimer, then a few short beeps just to make sure you are appropriately annoyed.

I a watching what is unfolding in this country of late with serious trepidation if not outright alarm. It’s not that elected officials from mayors, to governors, and everything in between are overreaching and exceeding the allotted power of their offices, it’s that, for the most part, people are going along with it without so much as a whimper.

Although the phrase has been butchered, sown together, and butchered anew, Benjamin Franklin once wrote that those who give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Within a couple of weeks, the land of the free and the home of the brave has turned into a place where governors order police to go door to door and check papers, threaten to permanently shut down churches if they are not obeyed, prohibit the freedom of movement, and dictate whatever they deem vital, on a whim, just because.

All this is happening not because there has been a nuclear attack, or because we are embroiled in a world war, but because as of now, 3,173 people have died thus far from a virus that mimics flu-like symptoms. In order to sprinkle a little context into this powder keg, an average of 7,450 people die each day in these united states. At least that was the number on the United States Death Clock. That there’s such a thing is a bit disturbing, but it’s the most reliable statistic I could pull as I waited for my coffee to brew. By the way, it’s only 5:32 am, central time, and already 1724 people have died in America today. Happy Tuesday!

People die! I know I’m a monster for reminding everyone, but this is just the reality of life as long as we are in these flesh suits. If we are fortunate, our children outlive us, and that’s the absolute best we can hope for. Living forever was never an option. It’s not multiple choice; it’s binary. It’s a foregone conclusion that all flesh is as grass, and the flowers thereof wither and fall away, so the only choice we are given is where we go once we’re gone.

It’s frightening how quickly we went from give me liberty or give me death, to give me bondage but not the flu.

If for nothing else, the following must be said for posterity: this is a test. It is a test of how far and how quickly an entire populace can be brought to heel. It is a test of how little pressure it takes for neighbor to turn on neighbor and start calling hotlines and reporting them for clearing their throat at an inopportune moment. It is a test of what it takes to whip people up into a frenzied panic. It’s all a test, and the results are worrisome.

And just so we’re clear, again, posterity and whatnot, the reason the death tolls in Italy are so astronomical is that they’ve decided that rather than autopsy, and determine the cause of death, now everyone who dies, dies from Corona. Thought I’d throw that in as well, because context matters.

In conclusion, just so we get a clear picture of it all, we’ve torpedoed our economy, done away with civil rights, gagged and bagged the first amendment, indebted our children’s children to the fourth generation, because of what amounts to half a day’s worth of deaths in this country. Imagine the lengths to which your government will go to protect you if something genuinely cataclysmic happened. Why, they might just put you in a camp, or throw your corpse into a mass grave for setting foot outside your home, you know, for your own good and protection, if something really gnarly were to occur. 

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr.