On Thursday, March 4, Federalist Press reporter David Marcus published an article saying that he had called on the mayor of New York a year ago to close schools to prevent the spread of the coronavirus (the Chinese Communist virus), but he was wrong. In the article, he analyzes the reasons for his mistake.
The following is a translation of his article.
On March 15 of last year, I wrote an article titled “Hey, De Baissehall (Mayor), Shut Down NYC Schools Now”. I was not the only one, but many people from both parties published similar articles at that Time. And frankly, at the time (those points) seemed to make sense. But now I know I was wrong, and I think I understand why I was wrong.
My basic point a year ago was that we didn’t know anything about the CCP virus or how it was spreading in schools. To me, it was wise to temporarily close the schools, especially because the New York City school district had not yet closed for the day because of the snow. Closing the school for a few days until we knew more about the situation seemed like a foolproof plan. But among other things, I failed to take the teachers’ union into account at the time.
By late summer, I was working on a book about the city closures. After talking with local elected officials in New York, I began to wonder if what these officials were telling me was true. That is, the fact that Mayor Whitehouse did not support closing the schools because once he rang the bell to close them, he could no longer easily get them to reopen from the ground up under pressure from the teachers’ unions. I can’t say for sure because I haven’t spoken to the mayor and he probably doesn’t want to talk about it anymore, but I highly doubt this is true.
A year ago it would have been hard for many of us to imagine that teachers’ unions across the country would be so stubbornly resistant to opening schools. Even when scientific research, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), was clear (indicating that schools could safely reopen), it (closing schools) was still arguably the most controversial action taken by an individual or group during a viral pandemic. And it is clearly unconscionable that we are still enforcing it in multiple parts of the country.
Even in the face of the incredible harm to children caused by school closures, teachers’ unions are still stubbornly stubborn while claiming to put children first. Nothing seems to be able to crack their hard shell. I’m sure the criticism of their selfishness will continue for a long time. This incident reflects some of the more far-reaching issues that we have learned in the lockdown.
Some things are hard to call off once they start. I understand and still agree with the initial blockade of the CCP virus, at least in New York City. In fact, the situation was so horrific that we really didn’t know if the hospital’s capacity to admit and treat people could keep up. Most people I interviewed, including politicians, restaurateurs and journalists, everyone thought the city closure would last a month at most, but somehow it turned into a year.
How the situation happened is a very complex topic. It definitely has something to do with the handing over of emergency powers to an obnoxious governor. But more than that, there was fear. Most fear is manufactured. And the government and media are so slow to inform the public of the truth, i.e., that most Americans are at relatively low risk of contracting the CCP virus, that perhaps they think people can’t get the truth right.
Fear is supposed to be a motivator. But we are wrong when fear paralyzes our lives and puts us into a single choice in order to alleviate those fears. And, often, we have to pay a high price for it. We’ve made a lot of these mistakes in the past year.
Clearly, we now know that schools should be open. And for that, not only because of the lies and greed of the teachers’ union, I am responsible. I really didn’t think about any of this when I arrogantly called for the school to be closed last year. I seemed to be catching on to what was going on at the time. It was a mistake, and it is a mistake I will try to avoid in the future.
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