Freedom day and other thoughts
Freedom day in Austria or let's please stop lying to people, pontoons in Pripyat, tanks in Tomarovka, Russia throwing around the word genocide, Canadian "truckers".
When I think of freedom, I think of the American west during the Reagan years. The free-ist place I ever lived. In the 80s, you could even walk into a restaurant wearing your gun on a holster if it was visible. My dad, freshly immigrated on an entrepreneur green card, and excited to rid himself of his communist childhood by playing American cowboy with real bullets, decided to wear his handgun into our local Mexican restaurant. The hostess gently asked him to leave it in his car.
You could do almost anything back then in Arizona without government interference. They handed us driver’s licenses on our sixteenth birthdays without ever having to take a driving test. Only sometimes the police would break up our teenage parties in the desert (desert which no longer exists and is how luxury housing), to which underaged boys somehow managed to bring entire kegs, by flying in a helicopter and telling us to all drive home safely. Even then, the police didn’t harass us white kids with cars (fully aware this was not the case in many other parts of the city).
So when I hear “freedom” I think of everyone being able to do whatever they want and being left alone by all forms of government, big and small. Therefore when I heard the news yesterday that Austria’s government was basically repealing all covid prevention measures as of March 5, I assumed (and because tabloids also pre-reported this rumour) it would also mean an end to the divisive and legally wobbly vaccine mandate. But now, the Austrian government did a very Austrian thing. Yesterday, it declared the pandemic no longer an issue as of March 5, while saying it had nominated a committee of experts to review the controversial vaccine mandate legislation it just passed in early February, to see if the new law should be repealed before enforcement is due to start in mid-March. Feeling confused? Join the club.
What I see in all of this is cowardice. I see a government that knows people are sick of the pandemic, the vast majority of vaccinated people do not get that sick with Omicron, and has therefore calculated it needs to give people their lives back in order to pacify the majority of voters. One thing this government has managed to do with flying colors over the past two years of pandemic mis-management: piss everyone off, right, left and center. Clearly the ÖVP-led government is worried migration of its base voters to far right parties like FPÖ and MFG (for those of you not in Austria — a new single issue antivaxx party). If that is the calculus, which from a political point of view makes sense, then why not immediately repeal the vaccine mandate? It is so poorly written, with exceptions, in particular the reckless exception for pregnant women, that is is probably slowly down vaccine uptake, rather than having the desired effect of more people getting first shots. Heard on the radio this morning: first shots have basically slowed to almost nothing.
The government needs a new speechwriter. It should have said “We know you are all sick of the covid restrictions. We are going to open everything up not because public health experts say this is the right time, but because public opinion is driving this decision, economic factors, etc.” Instead it tries to dance around a decision that it can’t easily back up with facts. Denmark was at least honest about its approach.
So here we are. Meanwhile I am still dropping off PCR tests nearly every morning for my two older kids who still have to test, I have no Genesen certificate for my youngest (I love the Austrian covid bureaucracy), no one knows what the rules are anymore so we took PCR tests to attend a concert tomorrow as 3x vaccinated (kind of crazy), and Vienna, playing politics, of course announced it will keep stricter measures in Vienna because the SPÖ always has to be different. Ok fine.
I’m still thinking about the crisis around Russia maybe or maybe not about to invade Ukraine any moment. I chatted with a friend in St Petersburg yesterday, who laughed off even the idea that Russia would do anything of force in Ukraine. I have a different perspective, perhaps because I spent way too much time online, and am focused on the increasing use by the Russian state of the triggering word “genocide”.
This reminds me all slowly a bit (not exactly of course) of the Serbian official spin during the 90s wars in ex-Yugoslavia. The wars were never actually fought on Serbian soil (with the exception of the unprecedented NATO bombings of Belgrade, of course), so it was easy to sell a message of victimhood to a people living next door to a war but not actively experiencing it in their own towns and villages.
Important to remember just what an information bubble most Russians live in. Hysterics by western media such as CNN but not only only play into the Kremlin narrative that the west has gone mad and the Biden White House wants a war more than anyone. Even people on the American left are starting to share those thoughts.
In terms of concrete evidence, mixed messages on Russia’s withdraws, and officially the military exercises in Belarus are only due to end on February 20. I have also been watching pontoon bridges unfold on the river Pripyat just near the Belarus-Ukraine border (I visited the abandoned town of Pripyat last week inside the Chernobyl exclusion zone), and tanks parading through the small town of Tomarovka, Belgorod region, on TikTok. Are these trolling videos and moves to make US satellites get hysterical? Or is Russia really up to something? I honestly cannot say, but it does feel like Russia is positioning itself to be able to react to whatever scene it may create any time.
I really don’t know. But I remain nervous.
If you would like to read something beautiful on Ukraine and Russia, this essay by Anastasia Edel is gorgeous and filled with nostalgia. I loved it.
I listened to two podcasts yesterday about the so-called Canadian truckers, who they really are, who is funding them, what they want. Very interesting stuff. They are raising millions of dollars online, with more than half the donations coming from the U.S.
First, this is great on both Russia/Ukraine and the Canadian protests:
This is great with a reporter from Toronto on the ground in Ottawa:
I linked to this in yesterday’s newsletter but in case you missed it, also read Talia Lavin on the truckers and their connections to a global far right movement.
Finally, yesterday evening I published a niche post on ÖBAG, the Austrian agency that manages the state’s shareholdings worth €34 billion in several major corporations. I took a closer look at who is actually running the place and what qualifications people have for being there. Management has been a bit of musical chairs the past few years as politically-nominated individuals became embroiled in scandal and had to leave. The emphasis on increasing the number of women on the boards has also had shall we say…some interesting results.
Hope you all have a great Thursday and thank you for reading!