Sorry but I can’t help but poke some fun at New Yorkers…I had no idea that those people were still under the illusion that “masks work” and that they were still required to wear them while on public transit – good grief. It’s September 2022. Apparently Governor Hochul, the replacement for the disgraced Governor Andrew Cuomo who stepped down earlier this year due to his scandals, made the decree today that masks would no longer be required. I’m sure this came after studying the science and all the studies about public health and Covid… yeah, right :).
People in the north have asked me many times…is it really that different in South Carolina from life in Minnesota, Illinois, New York, Pennsylvania….name whatever blue state you want – and yes, it’s different. And it’s been different for a long time. The people here in South Carolina are generally free. Would I like to see further elimination of some of the nonsense? Sure. But it’s magnitudes better than what you’ll find in a state like Minnesota for example.
With New York dropping their mask mandate, can we officially say that the Covid crazy policies are dying on the vine? One could hope…but then again, there’s always California.
But on second thought…we are only 2 months away from the 2022 mid-term elections. Perhaps THAT’s the science behind dropping the mask mandate on mass transit in New York?
It’s been quite a battle over masks the past several months here in South Carolina. I won’t go in to all the details but the main reason elementary and secondary school children are not masked is because there was a stipulation put in to the budget for this year that stated schools could not mandate masks.
As you could expect, they have been trying to work around it. The Department of Education has been and continues to be huge proponents of masking our children. They forced the issue with transportation requiring all students be masked. Now an Obama judge, Mary Geiger Lewis, who happens to be a Clemson grad and a Univ. of South Carolina law student, sided with the parents of immunocompromised children in a suit they brought forward with the help of the ACLU. By siding with these children, this opens the door to mask mandates being forced on several hundred thousand school children across the state. Greenville County Schools alone has more than 70,000 students. State Superintendent of Schools, Molly Spearman, is wasting no time telling schools that they MUST revise their mask policies if they had relied upon the excuse to not mask due to SC law since that law has been stuck down. They must come up with another reason why they aren’t requiring masks because they are out of line with the CDC which means they are out of line with SC DHEC and the expectations from the Department of Education….all this means is that we will likely see a lot of mask mandates in short order for our students.
I don’t have the details but I believe Attorney General Alan Wilson is challenging this ruling as might be a few of our state representatives. Here’s the memo Spearman sent to all school districts yesterday.
Meanwhile, it’s Wednesday afternoon and I fully expect we’ll have some school districts issuing mask mandates before the weekend.
Well, here we go…the crazies in Columbia, SC are hell bent on continuing with the fear propaganda. Remember we have a Republican Governor here in South Carolina by the name of Henry McMaster. If you’re looking at moving to SC because you are escaping a blue state, I’d give McMaster a C+ to B- grade. He is not DeSantis. His State Superintendant of Education is Molly Spearman. She just issued a mask mandate requiring all students and staff on any and all state-owned school buses. I don’t know how many state-owned buses Greenville County School uses but I will find out soon I’m sure and will update this post.
NOTE: “buses will be equipped with a supply of face coverings that meet CDC Order requirements. If a student boards without a face covering, drivers will offer the student a face covering. However, no student should be denied transportation for failing to adhere to the CDC Order.
I don’t know if there will be many students with the courage to get on those buses without a mask but according to Molly Spearman, they must be allowed to get on the bus even if their faces are not covered with a MASK!
Well it appears the City of Greenville has once again decided to embrace the mask 🙂 Yesterday it was announced that effective today, there is a mask mandate for all City of Greenville offices and buildings. This is not a citywide mask mandate and appears to be much more limited than the new mask mandate for Columbia, SC. Here is the official statement from the City of Greenville regarding their new mask mandate for August 2021.
If I’m not mistaken, I believe the City of Greenville is limited now in what it can require in terms of mask mandates across the city so they have gone with the limited edition – city buildings only. I do expect we’ll see a pick up in some mask wearing particularly downtown. We might even see some businesses decide to once again require masks to enter their stores, buildings, and offices. However, there has been a lot of push back against the masks. It’s hard to imagine that this latest round of government overreach makes it very far with the populace. Lots of people are getting tired of government telling them what they have to do. The Greenville area is generally considered a conservative bastion and they aren’t too fond of the masks or the vaccines.
If you want to follow along with how well South Carolina is doing with Covid, you’ll have no shortage of Facebook posts to read through at the SC DHEC Facebook Page. According to SC DHEC, Covid-19 – or the Delta Variant – is raging out of control across the state. That said, it appears that the number of Covid-19 Delta positives has dropped by about 50% in the past few days. I believe we were around 3,200-3,500 per day last week. Today’s report shows 2,220.
On Tuesday this week, South Carolina Governor, Henry McMaster issued a new executive order. He cut the legs out from the tyrannical city mayors and councils and school districts across the state with their silly mask mandates. It literally was CHECKMATE on the tyrannical actions of local schools and cities. It was brilliant.
There was immediate pushback from some places as seen on various posts on Facebook. Greenville County Schools which has been a huge proponent of the mask, was not going to give up their masks quietly. They issued a statement to the effect that they weren’t sure if McMaster’s EO was legal and their lawyers were taking a look. I believe it was then the next day that South Carolina’s School Superintendent issued her own statement saying they would drop the mask mandate due to to the Governor’s EO. I believe it was after that that Greenville County Schools succumbed to the dropping of the mask. However, I believe students need written permission on the specific state form in order to show up maskless. Then one by one, the mask mandates were dropped…cities and schools started to fall in line. The biggest one was the City of Greenville had to finally cave as they had no standing any longer.
All of this just shows me that this was all theater and there was no benefit to the mask. It just finally took political courage and leadership from our Governor to finally stand up to this nonsense. The maskers are ticked off of course. I’m sure the school districts are besides themselves and panicked as to what to do now. I like to say that Greenville became the Mask Capitol of the South. Good riddance to the mask but something tells me this isn’t over yet.
Apparently it’s still a Federal rule that school children must wear masks on buses. Good luck enforcing that. Businesses can still require masks so I’m sure there are plenty of restaurants in downtown Greenville who will leave their mask signs up and require their employees to be masked. But really, how silly is it at this point to require masks? Costco won’t give them up, that’s for sure. Put Best Buy in to that crowd as well. If they ever do give them up, you will know that the “pandemic” is truly over.
Earlier this week, a crowd of parents and students gathered outside of where the Greenville County Schools Trustees were having their meeting. They were calling for an end to the mask. Many of the maskers on Facebook were ridiculing these parents and kids for their efforts. However, the next day, the Governor dropped his Executive Order.
Now it’s on to continually reminding the voting public that these people put in the mask mandate. Every mayor, council member or school board member who voted for the mask must be voted out. Oh, and particularly for those in leadership at Greenville County Schools who are making it difficult just to drop the masks, I do hope you will continue to wear your mask until the last mask on a child is still showing up to school.
The City of Greenville, SC City Council has once again extended the ridiculous mask mandate for all public spaces and retail establishments within the city limit. The mask has been in place for months now with no end in sight. The council has once again demonstrated that they are against the people and prefer the heavy hand of government. This is yet another outrageous overreach by the Greenville City Council including the much loved Mayor Knox. They all need to go. None of them should be re-elected. It’s time to clean house in Greenville.
Here’s the link to the Greenville City Mask Mandate signed 4-8-21 document they all apparently agreed to unanimously. Remember, the City Council is supposed to be mostly “conservative” but that is not the case. While the Upstate is generally a conservative area, the City of Greenville has moved more leftward in recent years and appears to be well on it’s way to becoming a Democrat city just like Columbia and Charleston. The unfortunate thing for the rest of us in the Upstate is that the City of Greenville has a pretty significant impact on the rest of the cities and counties. It’s just comical at this point that these elected representatives and their health advisors whom they do not name, besides the CDC and the dreadful SC DHEC, believe that masks are going to save us from a virus which has a 99.97% survival rate.
It’s my opinion that if an elected official was involved in voting in a mask mandate anywhere in the country, they should not be allowed to hold elected office ever again. They also should not be allowed to be hired in any kind of government job as well. If city managers and staff are also on record as having supported the mask mandates, they should be replaced. I realize it’s not that easy to fire people and most of the people who work in government likely support the masks but if we ever get elected officials again who believe in the US Constitution and individual liberty, they need to make a point to clean out the leadership and ranks of those who wish to subvert our freedoms.
The City of Greenville, while a spectacular place to live work and recreate, has elected officials that continue to disappoint in a big way. All of you moving to the Upstate, you have been forewarned.