The President’s address today on the Coronavirus outlined his response to the outbreak, including suspending travel from Europe. The BBC covers it in this brief video. This is unprecedented and possibly necessary. The Independent goes on to question what would happen if the President were to invoke the Stafford Act. If unfamiliar, this act has been widely criticized as being a type of martial law that gives FEMA the ability to infringe unnecessarily on the rights of citizens.

This organization, FEMA, plays a huge part in the conspiracy theory laid out by the late William Cooper in his book Behold a Pale Horse. The theory is one of an impending mass roundup of undesirables by the government similar to that in Nazi Germany. This event would be perpetrated by a false declaration of National Emergency giving a cover story for mass disappearances.

This virus and the actions taken so far by the government do not in any way appear to be this conspiracy at work. The virus originated in China. According to the Chinese it was an accidental release from a biolab in Wuhan near Hong Kong. The virus has dominated the news to the disadvantage of the protesters in Hong Kong and the Uighurs in mass detention centers. It has also overshadowed other news worthy events.

The only concern is the potential to exploit similar events in the future. particularly if they begin to become the norm. If we start seeing pandemics on a repetitive basis with increasingly restrictive government measures we should start thinking about the frog in the pot.