Red Christmas, Italy closes out of panic: irrational and, therefore, illegitimate lockdown
The government and the political forces that preach "Competence" and cling to "Science", throughout the duration of the emergency have taken decisions dictated by panic, irrationality and political expediency. And now they want to lock us up at Christmas, in sharp contrast with the epidemiological data and indicators of recent weeks, denying the criteria that they themselves had set the day before yesterday. Illegitimate. Unconstitutional. Communist emergency in government
The government has not yet decided but the signs are clear. We are moving towards a red Christmas. Where the red color does not indicate the level of an alarm. But the communism red with which this government is tinged. There is a Communist emergency, we wrote it just a few days ago . And we confirm. It is in the emergency that politicians reveal their true nature. And that of those who govern us is profoundly communist, potentially totalitarian. We see it in the arrogance of declarations, in the ill-concealed taste in disposing of the lives of others in increasingly arbitrary, almost humoral, ways and times.
The decisive majority summit on the new anti- Covid restrictions to be adopted for the Christmas holidays has been postponed because the premier had to record a television broadcast with his friends from Fatto Quotidiano . With Italians hanging in uncertainty, families who do not know if and how to organize their movements, shops and restaurants who do not know what to do with orders, Conte plays with words, and with our lives, like any other caudillo .
If the government and the regions decide a generalized lockdown in sharp contrast to the data of recent weeks, they will have to explain it very well to the Italians. Why not, a decision with a huge impact both on fundamental freedoms and on our economy, cannot be justified in the abstract, with the simple possibility of a resurgence of infections on January 7, what they already call, quite inappropriately, as a threat, " third wave ". Decisions of this gravity must be based on scientific data, not on the mood of the moment. Also because, if we let ourselves be guided by fear and not by rationality, the time for reopening and normality will never come, not even when 50 million Italians have been vaccinated.
There is a huge short-circuit in the decision that is about to be taken: the government and the political forces that constantly repeat to us that we must rely on "Expertise", "Science", are guided instead by fear, indeed by panic, which is an irrational sentiment par excellence, when it does not give unspeakable political conveniences.
"It is time for rigorous choices by the Government and Parliament: only more restrictive rules during the holidays will be able to avoid a third wave of contagions", Minister Franceschini tweeted yesterday. But with the trend that has now been confirmed for a few weeks, even in yesterday's data, it would not be a rigorous choice but only arbitrary .
The data of the last 24 hours confirm the positive trend: the number of deaths is always too high (+680), but all the other indicators continue to drop considerably: intensive care -77 (and below the 3,000 threshold), ordinary hospitalizations -522 (and below the threshold of 30,000), positive / swab ratio below 9 percent (8.8 percent), Rt index in almost all regions below 1.
And in fact, as a further demonstration, according to the criteria recently set by the government and the CTS, as many as 21 indicators on the basis of which “color” the regions, to date 16 are yellow zone, 5 orange zone, no red zone.
It is therefore not clear on what basis the whole country should suddenly become a red or orange zone at Christmas. One of the two: o the criteria we have been following since November (which CTS and the government have set) were completely out of order, and we should have already been all in the red / orange zone, but then they should take responsibility and resign; or, the announced Christmas squeeze follows other inscrutable logics, in total lack of transparency.
And in fact, in Pilates style, the CTS evokes more restrictions and controls but taking care not to specify which ones. As an insider quoted by the Huffington Post explained yesterday, "we are aware of the risk of a third wave, but the data at the moment are not such as to require intervention, the CTS cannot give political coverage to the choices of the government, the their profession is another ". Translated: we cannot close on the basis of a risk, we need a trend that can be verified on the basis of reliable data.
What has changed then? Some photos with the crushed perspective plans of Christmas shopping in the most central streets of 3-4 major cities? After having encouraged purchases in physical stores by launching cashback in these days? We do like Merkel ?
In short, if it decides a red or orange lockdown at Christmas, the government denies itself, it denies its own criteria, for which almost all regions are now the yellow zone. A uniform provision throughout the national territory would indiscriminately deny the whole approach to differentiated zones followed so far, and proposed a few weeks ago as the most rational.
As we have been repeating since last spring, logic, reasonableness and proportionality are cardinal principles that must always guide the decisions of the legislator and the actions of the public administration, especially when they have such a profound impact on the fundamental freedoms protected by the Constitution. If the restrictive measures are not based on scientific data, then they are not inspired by these principles, they are illogical and excessive. And there is a legal consequence as well as a moral and political one: the act becomes arbitrary, in itself illegitimate, unconstitutional.
We were told in October by Prime Minister Conte "we close today to save Christmas" . But now, even in the face of improving data, it closes more than before, it is decided that Christmas is the time to lock everything up.
"We do not want to ban Christmas because it would be inhumane", and because "you cannot impose too many constraints" on people, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in yesterday's Downing Street briefing on the Covid emergency, while calling for minimizing the attendance at Christmas meetings. But you know, they love freedom. We love seriousness, so that we will end up having neither the first nor the second.
And the opposition? It's true: polls show that a majority of Italians seem to like the restrictive measures. The governors of the regions maintain a wavy and somewhat hypocritical line, eager and pawing for their regions to go from red to orange to yellow as soon as possible, but with rare exceptions always ready to approve if the lockdown concerns the whole country, thus lifting them their responsibilities.
National leaders, both Salvini and Meloni, do not fail to criticize the government's delays, failures, decision-making and communication chaos. But yesterday, at the presentation of Bruno Vespa's inevitable Christmas book, both Salvini and Meloni said they were willing to consider new restrictions, if necessary (“health comes first”), but in time and with reasonable compensation. Fig leaves, because both of them already know that there is no need, and that there will be neither time nor adequate compensation. Both are unfortunately failing to propose an alternative, especially on a cultural level, to the Conte government's approach. An approach that can be summarized in a few words: the emergency unloaded on citizens and businesses. They are too frightened to question the government's unconstitutional action in principle. But a certain leader long ago said: "Either we will stand on principles, or we will not stand at all" …
The post Christmas red, Italy closes for panic: irrational lockdown and, therefore, illegitimate appeared first on Atlantico Quotidiano .
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Atlantico Quotidiano at the URL http://www.atlanticoquotidiano.it/quotidiano/natale-rosso-litalia-chiude-per-panico-lockdown-irrazionale-e-quindi-illegittimo/ on Thu, 17 Dec 2020 05:00:00 +0000.