Tag: lockdowns

NYC bar owner who defied coronavirus restrictions arrested

An owner of a New York City bar that was providing indoor service in defiance of coronavirus restrictions was arrested after a sting in which plainclothes officers went inside and ordered food and beverages, the city sheriff’s office said.

Protesters shouted as deputies arrested Danny Presti, the co-owner of Mac’s Public House on Staten Island, on Tuesday.

The tavern is in an area designated by Gov. Andrew Cuomo as an orange zone because of spiking COVID-19 rates and was not supposed to be serving customers indoors. But the owners had declared the bar an “autonomous zone,” a nod to protesters who claimed control over a Seattle neighborhood in June.

Keep reading

Pandemic Rules Are Only for the Little People

The defining moment in the “rules for thee but not for me” ethos of the ruling class during the COVID-19 pandemic may have come when Neil Ferguson, the epidemiologist behind Britain’s lockdown policy, met with his married girlfriend in defiance of the restrictions he promoted. Eager to threaten the common people with penalties if they failed to socially distance, he saw no reason to inconvenience himself the same way—although at least he conceded that propriety required him to resign his government post when the trysts were discovered in May.

“He has peculiarly breached his own guidelines, and for an intelligent man I find that very hard to believe,” marveled Sir Iain Duncan Smith, a prominent member of the ruling Conservative Party. “It risks undermining the Government’s lockdown message.”

Well, yes. But like all too many officials, Ferguson obviously never thought he’d be caught violating rules that he’d never intended be applied to himself. As we’ve since learned, Ferguson’s above-the-law attitude is common among those who feel entitled to write regulations and impose penalties on others for violating them.

Keep reading

Facing another retirement home lockdown, 90-year-old chooses medically assisted death

Across Canada, long-term care homes and retirement homes are seeing rising cases of COVID-19 and deaths yet again, a worrisome trend that is leading to more restrictions for the residents.

But these lockdowns are taking another toll among those who don’t get COVID-19.

Residents eat meals in their rooms, have activities and social gatherings cancelled, family visits curtailed or eliminated. Sometimes they are in isolation in their small rooms for days. These measures, aimed at saving lives, can sometimes be detrimental enough to the overall health of residents that they find themselves looking into other options.

Russell, described by her family as exceptionally social and spry, was one such person. Her family says she chose a medically-assisted death (MAID) after she declined so sharply during lockdown that she didn’t want to go through more isolation this winter.

Keep reading

California megachurches rebrand as ‘family friendly strip clubs’ to protest state’s Covid-19 restrictions

Two megachurches decided to open Sunday services with some safe-for-work joke stripteases, in a cheeky protest against California’s closing down of churches due to the Covid-19 pandemic, while letting strip clubs stay open.

Before the start of Sunday’s sermon, pastors at two churches opened with short burlesque dance routines, taking off their jackets and even throwing their ties into the cheering audience.

“Strip clubs (Not Churches) are exempt from the Covid lockdowns, and are deemed essential by our governor!” said senior pastor of Awaken Church Jurgen Matthesius on Instagram. “So we decided we are NOW Awaken family friendly strip club!” he quipped.

The pastor then rolled with the joke, clarifying, “we strip the devil of his hold, power & authority over people’s lives!”

Keep reading

Watch as NY Business Owners Stand Up to Cuomo’s COVID Restrictions, Chase Agents Out of Building

New York business owners protesting COVID-19 restrictions put in place by Governor Andrew Cuomo confronted and chased away county health department agents after compassionately asking the bureaucrats to leave them alone.

About 100 business owners gathered inside the Athletes Unleashed gym in Orchard Park on Friday night to organize against the new “orange zone” regulations that requires businesses deemed unessential by the state to shut down and limits indoor gatherings to 10 people.

Video from the gathering shows the moment the business owners confronted two officials from the Erie County Department of Health, escorted by sheriff’s deputies, who were attempting to shut down the meeting.

Keep reading

SCOTUS Blocks New York’s COVID-19 Restrictions on Houses of Worship, Saying They Are Not ‘Narrowly Tailored’

The Court has said the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause does not require religious exemptions from neutral, generally applicable laws. But it also has said laws are presumptively unconstitutional when they discriminate against religion.

New York’s restrictions “cannot be viewed as neutral because they single out houses of worship for especially harsh treatment,” the majority says. In red zones, businesses deemed “essential”—including supermarkets, convenience stores, hardware stores, pet stores, liquor stores, laundromats, acupuncturists, banks, and various offices—operate without capacity limits. “The disparate treatment is even more striking in an orange zone,” the Court notes. “While attendance at houses of worship is limited to 25 persons, even non-essential businesses may decide for themselves how many persons to admit.”

Keep reading

These Governors Told Citizens To Stay Home. Then They Broke Their Own COVID Rules

Several Democratic governors who pushed Americans to stay home or to forgo Thanksgiving celebrations with their families have been accused of violating their own coronavirus restrictions.

A plethora of lawmakers across the country have been caught flouting the coronavirus restrictions, attending protests and ignoring their own social distancing guidelines. The mayor of D.C. and the governor of New York traveled to “high risk” states, Democratic leaders in New York were photographed attending a mostly maskless birthday party, and the governor of California and mayor of Philadelphia were photographed on separate occasions ignoring their own state restrictions on dining.

These incidents sparked outrage across the country in the past week. Video footage posted Sunday showed Democratic New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy confronted by two angry protestors who yelled at him and told him, “you are such a dick.”

“How you doing? How you doing,” a woman asked the governor, who was dining outside without a mask, which is in accordance with New Jersey coronavirus restrictions. “You having fun with your family in the meantime? You’re having all kind of other bullshit going on at your house?”

Keep reading