The early rumors of a deadly pandemic were disturbing, but most people simply prayed it would not visit our shores. And then it did. Early statistics from Italy and other hotspots suggested that COVID-19 might have a mortality rate approaching 10% — a horrific menace.
Like most Americans, I was concerned: friends and family in Poland, England, France, and Italy at this time reported widespread panic and suffering. Also, my great-grandmother had perished at a young age here in Vermont, in 1918, of Spanish flu — with five young children. I especially feared for my wife (an RN in a local hospital, with inadequate facial protection equipment) and our daughter (a full-time EMT). We often have greater fear for others than we do for ourselves; especially when that fear includes a monstrous ventilator machine drawing out an isolated, agonizing death.
John Klar
After about three months, the perpetual anxiety of the COVID threat became something I could not bear. I decided that I — or my wife or family members — might die from COVID-19, but that I was not going to be dead now. I could no longer live deadened or paralyzed by fear, so from then on I lived fearlessly.
This did not alter any of my outward behaviors. I still wore a mask in respect of others and their businesses; still respected social distancing. I just did these things without inner terror.
My “inner terror” really was for others, but not just for COVID illness. It was also for the school closings that frightened and alienated children while compromising their education and enjoyment of a precious, fleeting time of life; for those in addiction recovery who would be cut off from vital support groups, therapy, and health care; for the many businesses that were abandoned to economic ruin while many who don’t work received bountiful checks; for the dairy farms and cheesemakers who were financially devastated in Vermont.
As with my fears for health, these ancillary COVID harms had to be balanced if we were to respond rationally and reasonably to “our generation’s Spanish Flu.” We have better medicine than they had in 1918, and we don’t have to milk cows by hand. Surely we can respond sensibly, and without panic, if they did.
Now in May 2021, there are several facts that we know. We know that the very elderly or immunocompromised are at dire risk of death or serious illness from COVID-19, and so should be vaccinated and sheltered. We are told that there is as much as 94% effectiveness of protection for those vaccinated. The overall mortality rate from COVID-19 (even using the CDC’s rather dubious attributions of death) is less than 1% in the United States: for a man my age it is less deadly than flu; for a child without underlying illness it approaches zero. Influenza is more deadly (and we are told it has disappeared!). Healthy children are more likely to be struck by lightning than die of COVID!
These numbers were unavailable to me — to us — when COVID first appeared. It is sensible to shield the elderly, but not to stifle the lives of the young and healthy; let alone to terrify them with irrational fear. (As one Vermont Senator continues to try to do, fabricating facts for lack of data; weaponizing the disease to foment political fear and to agitate against fellow citizens). The argument that children should be vaccinated to protect the elderly is doubly upside-down: there is no evidence to show that is an appreciable threat, and even if there were there is no consideration of the impact on children. How about we risk the lives of us old people instead of compromise young lives, rather than the present vice versa?
Then there is the loathing, by people who snarl and shame anyone who doesn’t wear a questionably effective mask or line up eagerly for an experimental injection (because that is precisely what this is). This loathing and contempt toward others is a direct product of that fear that I cast off, but which conquered their joy. People gripped by perpetual fear will easily translate the slightest anxiety from even an irrational threat into a toxic personal crusade. It’s as if those of us who are free of fear must be dominated by the “least common denominator” of those who are (like the cowardly Senator McCormack).
But the opposite is the case: “The only thing to fear is fear itself.” Instead of fabricating unfounded fear, Vermonters want to enjoy some sunshine, breathe some fresh air, see unmasked smiling faces eating home cooked healthy food. And that should be the face of confident optimism that brave parents, leaders and grandparents present to the young who depend on us to model character and fortitude in the face of adversity. We will exhibit, and spread like a good infection, that cautious but hopeful optimism that says that the greatest threat to our children, liberties, mental health, and futures is not death by COVID-19 ventilator: it is suffocation by fear.
Let us teach others how much more enjoyable is a brave life aware of risk than a cowering enslavement in self-induced torment. The only thing to loath is fear itself — not those enjoying liberty rationally, without fear.
John Klar is an attorney and farmer residing in Brookfield, and the former pastor of the First Congregational Church of Westfield. © Copyright True North Reports 2021. All rights reserved.
I am very impressed with the broad understanding of all but one of these comments! People are searching for the truth, and they only find that away from the MSM. When we are lied to time and time again, there comes a time when we turn away from the hypocrites. As John put it so well, don’t live in fear. Worry is understandable, but fear devastates.
Father of the Wuhan virus, Fauci, should live the rest of his life in an orange jumpsuit. Firing him isn’t nearly enough for his gain-of-function obsession!
This music video of “Fear Is A Liar” by Zach Williams personifies “fear” and provides examples of just what deeply set fear can do to a person, whether young or old. Living in fear is a choice than one makes…and so is living in such a way as to oppose it and those who would attempt to instill it in us. May this song speak deeply into your spirit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1srs1YoTVzs
It seems that everything has been done to increase fear.
Recall that early on, we had reports from China that people were being welded into their homes, emergency hospitals were being built in a matter of weeks, and we saw video of people in China literally dropping in the streets from Covid-19. Scary.
Incredibly, in March, 2020, Dr. Fauci said in the New England Journal of Medicine that Covid-19 would likely be like a bad flu (he was right,) that the elderly were its primary victims, and that to date no children under 15 had been infected. This was Dr. Fauci talking sense, and it echoed what some prominent physicians, such as Stanford’s John Ioannidis, were saying.
But then, against all common sense, most of the world adopted a policy imported from a totalitarian regime, China, to force people to “stay some, stay safe.” Non-pharmaceutical measures were the watchwords: PPE, face masks, social distancing, because that was the only way out. We’re sorry, our Governor said, but there’s no other way. The WHO and CDC said there was no other way.
We were told that Elmhurst Hospital in Queens, NY, was being overrun. We were told that hospitals everywhere were being overrun. I saw the video that millions of others saw on TV, of lines of people waiting in pre-dawn darkness to get tested at Elmhurst hospital, of ambulances, of apparent emergency. Scary! But I also saw videos from ordinary citizens. I was particularly interested in one video from a man who showed that, a mere day or two after the Elmhurst scenes on TV, there was nothing going on at all in mid-day– nothing. No lines. No one there. No one in tents. Ambulances parked, no one in waiting rooms. Absolute quiet. I couldn’t believe it, so I went back to the TV newsreel and I studied the landmarks carefully: they were the same. It was the same hospital.
I saw videos of other hospitals and the same scenario unfolded: virtually no activity. I drove to Dartmouth-Hitchcock to see for myself, and sure enough the parking lots were virtually empty. There was no activity.
I can tell you that the scene at Elmhurst hospital was fabricated. How? You tell a largely hispanic community that there will be free Covid testing at 4 am, then you take care not to interview anyone to ask why they’re there. Maybe you even pay the people to get tested, you send out notices in Spanish language newspapers. You get an ambulance driver to drive by with lights flashing while the cameras are rolling– what would that cost, $100? $200? We saw similar reports around the country and the world (but not in the mainstream media) that after we were all told that our hospitals were overwhelmed, there was no one in waiting rooms, ambulances parked, no one in the tents– absolutely no one.
More scare stories: bodies pilling up, dead bodies in Sweden stored in freezers, etc. But these were all fabricated– the facts were only half-true. For example, it was true that bodies were piling up in NYC, but that was because some cemeteries refused to bury (alleged) Covid victims, and many cemetery workers were too afraid to come to work. Did the media dig into these stories to get at the truth? No, that wasn’t their job. Their job was to create fear.
I could go on and on. There were treatments for Covid-19, there was another way, and we knew that but the media gave those voices no air, and Dr. Fauci simply did whatever Gates and the WHO (Gates largely owns the WHO anyhow) told him to do, so that the world could be brought to its knees. Everyone was complicit: the CDC, the WHO, the news media, many of the politicians. Those who stood up against the madness were mocked relentlessly.
Covid-19 was the crime of the century. It was committed against we, the people, and its purpose was to move the Great Reset of humanity forward under a global government that would monitor and manage us, in a manner of the Chinese surveillance state, using technology. We have the technology. We can do this.
It is up to us to see this crime for what it is, and to stop it. Yes, it’s hard to believe but if you want proof that something is seriously amiss, simply look at what they’ve done with ivermectin, which could have saved many thousands of lives: this was deliberately withheld from the people. Ivermectin has been actively fought against by the WHO, the FDA, and the larger medical community, despite overwhelming science in its favor. They want people afraid, and they want them submissive to the state.
Just say “no.”
It’s very sad how this irrational fear mongering has done so much damage.
Of course early in the plandemic, we couldn’t know what would happen. So we went along with the masks and social distancing, etc.
Over time we could see that the risk was limited for most people. I’m pretty sure I had it a year ago, on Leap Day, Town Meeting Day. I had a slight fever, and some aches, but since then a really screwed up sense of smell and taste. I don’t like that, hope they come back, but I have no fear now but for the people who have lost their minds, and for the ruination of the economy, and destruction of our civil liberties.
Of course one is labeled a “CT” for thinking this was made to happen on purpose, like 9/11, and I can’t prove it, but the evidence is plentiful and easily understood by anybody without blinders on.
It’s hard to face the reality that there are people like Mr. Foochi, who are so evil that they would make something like this happen on purpose. Evidence for this, like the free-fall collapses and nanothermite residues at Ground Zero, divides us into those who dare look at the evidence, and realize this evil really exists, and the rest, who withdraw into irrational stupidity keeping their figurative blinders on as they keep their physical masks on.
To this day people try to tell me about how awful OMB is, taking an extra scoop of ice cream, injecting bleach, whatever. They have blinders on to what the governors did, putting the sick in nursing homes, wiping out old people, probably getting a financial reward for saving the states or insurance companies from paying to keep them alive…that sounds like a terrible accusation, but it’s the only logical explanation I can see, no matter how unimaginably diabolical it is. There is evil!
So Trump insulted Rosie O’Donnell. Well boo hoo.
“Science says” hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin cure or prevent this disease. So we can’t have them. We are supposed to just drop dead, and be happy that Sleepy Joe runs the show now.
He did his job as best he could, considering the endless attacks from the swamp rats and drive-by media. He also exposed the utter vile corruption in the media and government institutions, and any objective accounting of this history would have to say, he was the best president of our lifetimes.
The fools can’t save themselves, because they are so exposed that their reputations are ruined forever, and his can only get better because his accusers are exposed as liars, hypocrites, and enemas of the state.
Great article, John.
Mr. Cassady, your comment sure shows you are a Trump hater. First off Pres Trump tried to get hydroxychloroquine which was already approved by the FDA, to be used. He even took it… But the democrats wouldn’t go along with it. As for the scientists the democrats and RINO’s would not listen to the scientists, The democrat politicians thought they knew better than the scientists
Being a politician doesn’t make you smart. If you’re going to put blame on certain people start with your party.. the democrats !!!!
Vermont uses to be a great republican state. now it’s full of out -of state democrats and yes we have RINO’s republicans ( we have one whos’ our so-called Governor who’s more a democrat and a puppet…
What happened to this country is FEAR.. it’s our worse enemy. and people who don’t stop and use their heads , you know the type.. the sheep.. who follow…
I don’t always agree with Mr. Klar but a lot that he has been saying in the past few months I have agreed with..As he was speaking the truth..
Mr. Klar uses his argument to minimize the Covid experience in this country. What he ignores in his assessment is the very simple fact that every politician, scientist and governmental agency was trying to make reasonable policy on the fly. That is (which he ignores); there was little evidence for action early on and, as Covid developed, his party head, Trump, needed to attack the science as it developed because he (Trump) knew he was poorly equipped to lead this country in that particular circumstance.
So, it was left to state Governors to discern what the direction should be. They had not federal guidance. Most governors on both sides of the aisle did a great job. Some that bought the Trump line screwed the hell out of their citizens by extending the death and misery that otherwise could have been more mitigated.
So, Mr Klar use your considerable intelligence to assess situations in an objective manner, not a political one!
While we all lacked sufficient info early on, that was not the case as time went on. For instance, the CDC and others in government have known for some time now that Covid isn’t transmitted outdoors to any appreciable extent at all, yet they kept up the pretense that it was. This resulted in everyone wearing masks outdoors, even double masks! People were terrified to pass others on the street, bike path or hiking trail if they weren’t masked. People yelled at those who weren’t masked. And so on. Until finally, the NYT of all things, disclosed this fact.
The numbers of those who have been infected with Covid have been massaged by adhering to a higher than reasonable number of cycles for the PCR test; interesting that now the CDC will use a lower level for testing the vaccinated but continue using the higher faulty level for the unvaccinated. Many who died “with Covid” have been tallied as dying “of” Covid.
As for masks, it’s pretty clear that most of the masks that people wear aren’t very effective, yet people have been shamed, bullied and forced into wearing them.
I could go on but I won’t. John Klar speaks the truth.
I believe it was on March 23, 2020, that Dr. Zelenko alerted us that hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin, and zinc in combination were effective treatments for Covid-19, according to his own experience. The logic of the mechanism for action was sound. Trump promoted this. The result? Widespread mockery, portrayals of Trump as the “hydroxychloroqueen,” and Dr. Fauci lifting not one single finger to determine if this safe medicine– with a very low dosage taken for only five days in an outpatient setting!– was effective.
We knew. We knew long ago what could be done. Trump was right.
It was the height of folly and betrayal to ignore this medication. Worse, the most prestigious medical journal in the world, The Lancet, published a bogus study on hydroxychloroquine in an attempt to convince us that this medicine was useless and dangerous. The result? Readers noticed that the data were impossible, and in fact it was completely fabricated. Completely fabricated data in the world’s most prestigious medical journal in a time of medical crisis! How can that possibly be? How could that possibly get through peer review? The paper had to be retracted.
If we drill down into what really happened in the Covid-19 saga, we see nothing but betrayal at every turn. We could’ve licked this thing long ago, but instead we had our poor children running around with face masks as they played ball.
I’m sorry, folks, I’m so disgusted by our “science.” I believe that when all is said and done, we will find that we, the people, we’re deliberately denied life-saving medications. Deliberately.
I couldn’t agree more. We are now a state and a nation of sheep in the majority. There are a few original boy scout still around. We are the sheep dogs! We take orders from our conscience not ideologs. Without liberty there is no unity.
Mr. Cassady,
With all due respect, every comment you have posted is political in nature as you just did.
Governors who placed infected patients back into nursing homes were reasonable? Cuomo had more medical facilities (a ship, a field hospital) and medical supplies as did Newsome, Whitmer, Murphy and Wolf. Whatever they demanded, they got, and what did the do with it? The beauty of the Truth is no matter how these politicians and bureaucrats try to cover it all up, the Truth shines through time and time again. Going back to the governors conference a few years back when all those smiling governors entertaining the CCP operatives surely speaks volumes to me. The bio weapon was no accident and the world war it started is absolutely real.
Mr. Cassady, please follow your own counsel. I did not vote for Donald Trump, so your effort to make all things Trump falls particularly flat here. You and the deluded Left must come up with an alternative policy than “Everything is Trump’s fault.” It doesn’t stick to me, and it will stick to less and less as time passes. What happens when you have to apply your intelligence to reality? Have you applied it to the economic costs, and costs to Vermont’s children, that you ignore while trying to focus instead on Trump? It’s shallow, and kinda pathetic. But hey, if that’s the most intelligent strategy the Left can contrive, I guess that leaves everyone else to lead. The point of the article is to not allow fear to dominate our lives: leave it to a Leftist to try to dismiss that message using yet another Trump assault….