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As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing well exactly what the title suggests, that there are no more mask mandates in the United States. This came to my attention via Bloomberg, bloomberg.com, the article is titled: U.S Stops Mask Requirement on Planes After Judge's Ruling. I sort of like how they, again the Media framing of these things is really odd to me. I will get into this but the headline to me should read: US Court Rules Mask Mandates Illegal. That should be the headline because that is directly what happened. Getting into this, quoting directly: "Passengers on airplanes, trains and other public transportation in the U.S. don't have to wear masks anymore after a Federal Judge struck down the Mandate. The U.S. Transportation Security Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said orders requiring masks on public transportation would no longer be enforced." Well, yes of course, they are illegal, the Court said so. No, they are not going to be enforced. Well one, they weren't a law anyway which was always an issue in my mind but finally you have got around and gotten in to the US Federal Court and BOOM now which to me was as self-evident as self-evident gets, it's a plain language reading of the US Constitution but quoting further here: "US District Judge Katherine Kimball Mizelle in Tampa, Florida vacated the mass requirement nationwide Monday and directed the CDC to reverse the policy put in place in February 2021." I thought that was interesting. I thought this was a longer thing but apparently not. It has only been going a little over a year. Quoting further: "The ruling was handed down in a lawsuit filed last year by the Health Freedom Defense Fund, a non-profit group that says it focuses on, "bodily autonomy as a human right", which it is a human right. I mean bodily autonomy is about as basic a human right, natural right, in the American context Constitutional Right; basic natural law as far as I am concerned. Quoting further: "Today's Court decision means CDC's public transportation masking order is not in effect at this time." That is a really interesting one. Where did CDC ever get the authority to unilaterally order anything? Good question. Quoting further: "An Administration Official said in a statement: "Therefore TSA will not enforce its security directives and emergency amendment requiring mask use on public transportation and transportation hubs at this time." Quoting further: "United Airlines Holding Inc. and Alaska Air Group Inc. reacted swiftly to the TSA decision dropping mask requirements from passengers on their flights shortly after the TSA announcement."

All good news, all great news as far as I am concerned. It should have been done a long time ago; should have never happened; should have never happened, the requirement in my opinion. People can decide how they want to deal with their own health and their own bodies, period. The notion of forcibly making people wear things and essentially impeding the natural flow of their breathing, I mean to me that is just self-evidently not within any Government or any person's power. You don't have that authority to tell somebody that on a personal level, on a community level whatever, just no, as far as I am concerned. 

So good news there for those traveling in and out of the United States. Definitely less consternation going to be had on those flights, at least domestically in the US, hopefully internationally. Hopefully the rest of the world especially the free World like here in Thailand is going to cotton on to this sooner rather than later. It is really time to put this behind us. This whole 2-year episode, I hope I don't even want there to be any acrimony frankly. No people say “oh people should be held accountable”, well you know everybody got hysterical at the end of the day. Yes there should be some accountability; yeah there are some specific individuals especially in policy positions that it may be a good idea to scrutinize their activities mostly in the United States. I have to be honest, I haven't been all that unhappy overall. I don't like the policy outcomes but I don't think anybody in Thailand has been acting in any kind of level of faith. I just think hysteria overcomes people and people get overly worked up about something and it just happened, bad things happen as a result of that. What I am hoping more than anything is we can look back on this one of these days and realize it is a cautionary tale from our own history, recent history and hopefully something we can put fully behind us sooner rather than later.