COVID Response: Do We Really Want To Go Back To That?

After the lockdowns, what did the government teach me about government power?

Luis Gonzalez | September 22, 2026

COVID changed the way I hear the word “temporary.”

Before 2020, 'temporary' was temporary. Something happened, you dealt with it, and eventually you went back to living your life.

Most of us remember the rest. The empty streets. The closed businesses. The masks. The six-foot circles on the floor. Schools closed, churches restricted, nursing homes became nearly impossible to visit, and governments suddenly had an extraordinary amount to say about what ordinary Americans could and could not do.

I don’t need to make a list of everything that happened. You lived through it.

What interests me now isn’t relitigating every lockdown decision or deciding which governor got which decision right. It is what the whole experience taught us about government power.

We learned that “temporary” can become a remarkably elastic word.

We also learned how quickly people will surrender ordinary freedoms when the circumstances are frightening enough.

I understood the fear. I had elderly people in my family, and I wanted to protect them. That’s why I eventually took the COVID shot.

I don’t regret doing it for them.

But I remember watching government move from telling us to be careful to telling........

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