As Alabama trades off with Mississippi for the dishonor of being the state with the nation’s lowest COVID-19 vaccination rate, one of its officials is raising the specter of federal agents going door to door, subverting personal freedom.
“Ban home intrusion by vaccine squads in Alabama,” Alabama state auditor Jim “Zig” Zeigler declared.
Last week, President Biden said vaccinations had stalled just as the latest variant was proving itself alarmingly more infectious.
“Now, we need to go to community by community, neighborhood by neighborhood, and oftentimes, door to door—literally knocking on doors—to get help to the remaining people protected from the virus,” Biden said.
Tucker Carlson of Fox News went full loony in response.
“The idea that you would force people to take medicine they don’t want or need—is there a precedent for that in our lifetimes?” he said. “I honestly think it’s the greatest scandal in my lifetime, by far. I thought the Iraq War was; it seems much bigger than that.”
And two Capitol cuckoos chimed in.
“Needle Nazis,” Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) said.
“Medical brownshirts,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) said.
While Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves avoided any Hitler allusions, his spokesman made clear he is nobody’s RINO, or Republican in Name Only.
“The vast majority of Mississippians are already aware that if they want a vaccine, they have access to it,” the spokesman told Y’all Politics.
“Governor Reeves continues to encourage Mississippians to get vaccinated, but believes in their right to decide what is best for them and their families. President Biden’s plans are light on details and heavy on invading people’s right to privacy.”
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey responded as if it were an attempt to trample the rights of good, God-fearing Americans.
“We are all for educating people on the COVID-19 vaccine, but from the little we know about this program, it does not seem like the answer,” an Ivey spokesperson said. “Governor Ivey has no plans to put in a request for government workers to knock on people’s doors here in Alabama.”
A reasonable person with the public good at heart would have asked, why not? Why wouldn’t a governor approve of vaccine teams going door to door when COVID cases in the state have risen 159 percent over the past two weeks with an average of 472 new cases a day? Why not facilitate shots when the state’s vaccination rate is 33 percent, effectively tying Mississippi?
But reasonable people apparently have no future in the Republican Party. And Zeigler is forming what he terms “my exploratory committee” to run for governor in Alabama. He called on the present governor to stop the impending invasion by “vaccine squads.”
“I ask that you immediately take the strongest steps to clearly direct federal agents and their recruits that their entry onto home properties in Alabama could legally be considered trespassing,” he said. “The Biden plan to have door-to-door visits by agents of the government or even local recruits is wrong on several levels. The decision to take or not take the COVID vaccine is each individual’s decision.”
Zeigler seemed to be channeling Carlson, though he told The Daily Beast: “I’m one of the 1 percent of Americans who don’t have a TV.” He declined to say on the record whether he himself has been vaccinated.
“I don’t think whether I was vaccinated or not has much to do with vaccine squads going door to door,” he said.
He added, “In Alabama, a person’s home is their castle. It’s almost sacred. You don’t have intruders, particularly government agents or their nominees coming on someone’s property.”
He suggested that anything the government has to say about vaccines can be delivered by other means.
“We have internet, TV, radio, phones, the U.S. Post Office, email,” he said. “It’s a step too far going house to house. It’s deeply resented in Alabama.”
He insisted getting vaccinated is purely a personal decision. He hesitated when asked about the added opportunities the virus gets to mutate with each new infection.
“I don’t know about that,” he said. “I think that’s under study.”
He called into question the significance of the state’s 33 percent vaccination rate, saying “I’m not sure I buy that” because it did not take into account the hundreds of thousands who have been infected and therefore given some measure of immunity.
“We don’t have an epidemic going on here at present,” he said.
He reported that he had received a tremendous response on Facebook.
Lyn Helton: Ivy will not do anything. She is a democratic pawn.
Ronnie Turner: shes a rino.
Lovie Lovelace: Ban it!
William Russ: All i can tell them is who let the dogs out.
Melvin Cleveland: They won’t like where I tell them to put their needle.
The state’s fearmongers might point to the patient at Thomas Hospital in Fairhope who died from COVID-19 complications last month despite having been vaccinated. And on top of that, the facility’s medical director, Dr. Michael McBrearty, reported that four of the nine patients with COVID in the ICU had been vaccinated.
McBrearty could not be reached for comment, but he told local TV news that other health factors and genetics might figure in the cases. He said that one lesson he drew from the breakthroughs is that COVID-19 is not done with us. And in his view, that is all the more reason to get vaccinated and, yes, wear a face covering.
“There are so many variables I can’t address right now because some people get it and some people don’t, but still it doesn’t distract from the fact that the best thing we got right now are the masks and the vaccinations," McBrearty was quoted saying.
Now that is a voice from the front line we all need to hear. That is actual leadership.
Meanwhile, we have the likes of Zeigler joining Carlson and Boebert and Greene in their perpetual race to the bottom, seeming to seek the basest of the base from which to elevate themselves.
On Monday, Zeigler checked in on Facebook at a big gathering at the Convention Center in Mobile sponsored by the state education department.
“Meeting with 3,600 educators, administrators and support personnel,” he posted.
Zeigler reported that he escorted his wife, who attended as a public school administrator.
“I went as a spouse.”
But he figured the exposure could have only helped his nascent campaign. He says his Facebook group is up to 51,000 members. He did express some concern for any vaccine squads that start going door to door.
“I worry about their safety,” he said.
