SCV Camp 1524 Commanders Column for August 2022 - Blind Mandate Government Overreach

Heard an astounding radio ad spot today sponsored by the nanny state petitioning listeners to visit vaccine.gov and to get their boosters for “added protection”.   Every day there is more anecdotal evidence as well as a growing body of research that supports that the mRNA COVID vaccines with their spike protein carriers may cause harm to those inoculated.   The Twitter universe is rampant with posts of people claiming to have had serious side effects after getting the vaccine and/or boosters.  “The German Federal Ministry of Health (BMG) admitted 1 of every 5,000 COVID-19 vaccinations cause “serious side effects.”  Although likely an “underestimation” due to voluntary reporting the admission implies almost 300,000 Americans and Europeans have experienced a severe adverse event after receiving a Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine” including myocarditis and pericarditis and menstruation disruption.  (https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/germany-covid-vaccine-side-effects/)  The efficacy of the vaccination has also come into serious question with those receiving even multiple boosters becoming ill with the latest variants of the virus.  Vaccine “protection waned to negligible levels within 4-7 months” according to a study published in The Lancet.  (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8871492/)  It is accepted that the elderly and those with serious underlying medical conditions and comorbidities which may make them more susceptible may seek to stay fully vaccinated requiring frequent boosters.  But long-term side effects given a questionable medical preventive benefit is leading more and more to question the rationale and safety of these mRNA vaccines especially for lower risk and younger patients. 

This brings back to the debate the legitimacy of the original mandates from the federal government.   While the federal government sought to keep the population safe from what appeared to be a serious pandemic threat, the pharmaceutical companies profited by suppressing data on efficacy and side effects/safety and seemingly continue to espouse the benefits of continuing on an endless booster regimen even for small children while reaping multibillion dollar government contracts for these vaccines.  The Supreme Court in January of this year blocked the federal government’s vaccination mandate thru the OSHA rule for employers calling it a "blunt instrument that draws no distinctions based on industry or risk of exposure to COVID-19."  This ruling in support of a lower court ruling which stayed the mandate accepting plaintiffs’ position that OSHA’s "claimed authority over [employees'] private lives and vaccine status is an egregious government overreach."  (https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/legal-and-compliance/employment-law/pages/supreme-court-vaccine-or-testing-rule.aspx) 

Those who oppose the federal mandate cite the Tenth Amendment which provides that “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people” and previous Supreme Court rulings have supported that “the state legislatures (should) decide whether or not vaccination is the best way to protect public health.”  (https://lawreview.law.miami.edu/federal-covid-19-vaccine-mandate-constitutional-issue-proper-exercise-emergency-powers/)  And accordingly, when the states have enacted legislation regarding vaccine mandates recently, twenty have passed laws supporting individual freedoms and restricting their state governmental agencies from requiring vaccinations.  This all harkens back to the principle of states’ rights and a limited government.  These states’ rights principles are the very same which our Confederate forebears sought to defend in resisting the invasion of their states by Lincoln’s Union army.  The relevance of the Cause is very much still alive today.