For the last couple of decades, the “Nobel Prize” for anything was almost always awarded to someone from the left or the far-left. Like the former highly distinguished “Pulitzer Prize,” it had devolved into an ideological trophy given to entrenched liberal elites from entrenched liberal elites.
But then came 2009 when the Nobel Committee completely jumped the shark and made the once venerable award a laughing stock to many around the world. That was the year they awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to newly elected President Barack Obama for literally doing nothing.
In trying to justify their clearly embarrassing decision, the committee said they had chosen Obama in the hope he would make “extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.
'The hope.'
Wow. If only diplomas, job promotions, bonuses, and Super Bowls were decided that same way.
Come 2015, even the Secretary of the Nobel Committee realized the error of their teeny-bopper adoration for Obama ways. Admitted the Secretary in part: “Even many of Obama’s supporters believed that the prize was a mistake. In that sense, the committee didn’t achieve what it had hoped for.
No, but the committee did confirm it was hopelessly and humiliatingly in the tank for liberals and Democrats.
Now, flash ahead to February of 2022.
For the last two years, the pandemic has upended the world while spawning massive shifts of power and heartbreaking loss of life. As this tragedy continues to unfold, various governmental leaders and “experts” have asked and begged the people to “trust them.”
Fine. But isn’t “trust” a two-way street?
These politicians and unelected bureaucrats have constantly asked us to make “informed decisions.” But isn’t factual, unbiased, and uncensored information needed to make an “informed decision” or to give “informed consent?”
Sadly, and often tragically, we saw that those who did have – or were given – domain over the people, regularly dispensed draconian edicts, punishing lockdowns, contradictory mask mandates, and never-ending insults for anyone who dared to question their rule.
From those “drunk on power” episodes, two groups emerged which opened the eyes of millions of people around the world to the potential and real abuses of such unchecked, totalitarian power.
The first was the doctors behind the “Great Barrington Declaration.” Those doctors are Martin Kulldorff, professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, Sunetra Gupta, professor of theoretical epidemiology at the University of Oxford, and Jay Bhattacharya, professor of medicine at Stanford University.
From day one, the declaration put forth by these three eminent physicians – and then endorsed by thousands of other doctors and healthcare providers – warned that the lockdowns were counterproductive and dangerous and that “focused protection” of the most vulnerable was the wisest course of action.
You would think they would be applauded for offering up “the basic fundamental principles of public health that existed in the pandemic preparedness plan that was prepared many years before.”
No.
Instead, they were attacked by many of their liberal colleagues who had seemingly chosen ideology and power over medicine.
The two most prominent attackers of these three doctors and their very pragmatic declaration are Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins, the then director of the National Institutes of Health. Only because of Freedom of Information requests, it was revealed that just days after the Great Barrington Declaration was published, Collins emailed: “This proposal from the three fringe epidemiologists…seems to be getting a lot of attention. There needs to be a quick and devastating published takedown of its premise…”
First, it’s good of Collins to warn us that Harvard, Stanford, and Oxford are in the habit of hiring “fringe epidemiologists.”
Next, it’s even more telling to read a response from Fauci to Collins which said: “I am pasting in below a piece from the Wired [magazine] that debunks this theory…”
Collins then answered: “Excellent.”
To the surprise of no one who pays attention to the draconian ways of some on the Left, just days after that email exchange, the Liberal Lords of Big-Tech started to censor search results for the Great Barrington Declaration.
Of course, now, in February of 2022, it is becoming more and more obvious – even to a growing number of liberals – that the doctors behind the “Great Barrington Declaration” truly were putting forth pragmatic, commonsense, and medically justified advice.
And from those falsely maligned doctors, we transition to the “Freedom Convoy” of hundreds of truckers which made their way across Canada to Ottawa to bring needed attention to the tyranny of job and life-destroying vaccine mandates. A protest which not only went on to captivate much of the world while opening even more eyes to the brutish tactics of some of the elite but which caused Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to flee his office and home and go into hiding.
One can only assume that the children of the truckers along for the ride laughingly jumping up and down in their bouncy houses must have petrified the faintly “World Leader.”
After several days of such dishonorable and assumedly humiliating hiding, he pompously stepped forth to invoke the “Emergencies Act” law against the Truckers. A law that had never been used since first approved in the 1980s. A law designed only to protect Canada from extraordinary calamities such as terrorism, war, or an invasion.
Not against honking horns and children in bouncy houses.
What then took place in Ottawa was quite ugly and even terrifying.
I spoke with a Canadian official who summed it up by saying: “The pandemic has brought out the inner-Gestapo in a number of our police and the inner-dictator in a number of our politicians and alleged experts.”
An authoritarian overreach we have witnessed in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and even the United States.
Many people believe Liberty is a God-given right. Period. Others believe it is a human right.
The doctors behind the “Great Barrington Declaration” and the Canadian Truckers have shown the world that autocrats petrified of the people will often cross any line to steal that gift of Liberty.
Surely, that makes them worthy of consideration for a Nobel Prize.
***
Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official and author of the book: The 56 – Liberty Lessons from those who risked all to sign The Declaration of Independence: Before they and the 4thof July are banned.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member