Ohio Curfew Starts November 19th
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine just issued a curfew for our state which takes effect Thursday November 19th. The curfew covers the hours between 10pm and 5am daily.
I find this interesting because I am not entirely sure what their angle is. There is already a 10pm closing time for bars and restaurants. Maybe this is to avoid closing other businesses, and allow citizens to make essential errands without necessarily weighing on businesses directly. Also, my wife and I tend to be inside by 10pm already. I’m easily within an hour of lights out by then.
We have already figured that we are among the most compliant with pandemic restrictions since March of 2020. We have made two trips outside of the metro area since February 2020, and have been strategic about shopping, etc. I think our biggest exposure was having numerous contractors in the house this year for remodeling. Our plumber actually took his family to the beach in Florida in the middle of our remodeling. I wanted to kill him, but he wasn’t a believer in the seriousness of the pandemic.
The curfew will be controversial. I’m curious t see how it plays out. I never liked our Governor, DeWine, but he has handled the pandemic beautifully. People should cut him some slack when they find out about the new curfew, sometime today. But, they wont.
Myriad
11/17/2020 @ 4:14 pm
Not sure what a curfew is supposed to do. Covid doesn’t care about curfews. Good on you guys keeping safe & sane. No curfews or rules up here – but more and more people are masking. (I only venture out to PO, drugstore & occasional grocery run.)
Jonna Connelly
11/18/2020 @ 12:59 pm
The reasoning I’ve heard for curfew and business closings is that people tend to get loosened up and more careless later in the night.
Bitey
11/17/2020 @ 6:42 pm
The use of a curfew is that it allows law enforcement to question anyone seen in public as to…why they are in public. The assumption is that they would be home. So…if they are seen at a party, and they do not live there, they must have a good explanation. Simply having businesses close is one thing. A curfew is a more assertive step, and with the political environment, it could be dicey.
Myriad
11/17/2020 @ 8:49 pm
Ah – it’s gonna rile up all the FREE-DUMBers
Ron Powell
11/17/2020 @ 9:42 pm
If the virus could tell time, a curfew would make sense.
Closing all nonessential businesses at 10 PM is a defacto curfew….
As a practical matter the only curfew violators will be homeless people.m which makes a curfew a way of making being poor and poverty stricken illegal…
The people most likely to be disproportionately affected by the enforcement of a curfew are the black and brown folks who are disproportionately affected by COVID19…
Good luck with that gem of a move toward social justice…
Bitey
11/17/2020 @ 9:47 pm
I agree. And it is not a move toward social justice at all. Everything you say there is true, of course.
Here is what you don’t know. Civil liberties break down in emergencies. Lincoln suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
Ron Powell
11/18/2020 @ 12:18 am
@Bitey;
“Here is what you don’t know. Civil liberties break down in emergencies. Lincoln suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War. Desperate times call for desperate measures.”
What I don’t know?
Re the breaking down of civil liberties:
The Emancipation Proclamation was a violated the 5th Amendment to wit:
“….No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law….”
Perhaps you weren’t aware of the fact that, when Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, slaves were still considered ‘property’.
Freeing the slaves in direct violation of the 5th Amendment right to due process was the most desperate measure Lincoln could take during the most desperate period of the Civil War…
Suspending habeas corpus was child’s play in comparison…
Ron Powell
11/18/2020 @ 12:38 am
Before we get hung up on a slight typographical error which creates an error in syntax, here’s my
CORRECTION:
‘The Emancipation Proclamation violated the 5th Amendment.’
Bitey
11/18/2020 @ 6:49 am
So, you’re saying that restricting slave owners rights in the effort to defeat slave states, and create a condition where such rights would not exist is the same as restricting rights of all citizens, in order to improve a health condition, and return to a condition where all citizens rights are returned is analogous? I disagree. I see two different types of processes. Not the least of which is negotiation was always available, and ultimately used as leverage. Conversely, a virus can’t enter a negotiation. It can only be physically and chemically manipulated. A curfew facilitates a physical manipulation by removing mucous membranes from access.
Ron Powell
11/18/2020 @ 9:17 am
No, I’m not saying that at all.
I’m saying that if a virus could tell time , a curfew would make sense….
You brought up the suspension of habeas corpus as an example of a drastic or draconian , or desperate measure in the face of an extreme public emergency…
The COVID pandemic is an extreme public health emergency to be sure but I’m not persuaded that a curfew which would primarily impact a specific segment of the population is either necessary or appropriate…
In my view, using the pandemic to declare homelessness illegal is not the best way to stop or curtail the spread….
koshersalaami
11/18/2020 @ 12:02 am
It would help if the Governor gave his rationale
Art W. Stone
11/18/2020 @ 10:36 am
My own curfew has been far earlier than 10 pm this year.
Law enforcement in Oregon has taken a hands off approach to the houseless now for some time, but we have areas where I suspect it would generate the possibility of increased questioning of BIPOC citizens. That is the tacit reasoning most likely behind Gov. Brown not calling for a formal curfew.
While Oregon’s restrictions do not include a curfew they are strict.
They are strict enough to have brought Governor Brown national attention, and quite likely an appointment by President-elect Biden that will have her leaving her position.
In Oregon the Secretary of State functions as a Vice-Governor. A woman by the name of Shemia Fagan, soundly defeated the Republican running against her so she will move up to become Governor.
11/19/2020 @ 12:15 pm
We’ve had a curfew also, for a few weeks. My sense is the reason was that college kids were packing into the bars and getting too drunk by 10 to practice social distancing. That they were social distancing or even wearing masks while in a college bar to begin with seems an unreal expectation.
One of the swankier bar/restaurants in town recently began offering cocktails to be picked up curbside. They cost ten bucks each and are fancy looking, not just a bunch of booze in a plastic cup.
Bitey
11/19/2020 @ 1:35 pm
I have been amazed at how important drinking alcoholic beverages is to so many. I have some here in my home, but I would not risk my life for them. I know we have fought battles over how the industry is managed, but it seems like a low priority extra for me. And, now, to see many ‘normal’ activities pared back or discontinued, the degree to which so many will risk everything to imbibe just astounds me.
11/19/2020 @ 2:48 pm
I don’t drink at all, not since my teenage rebel years. I never enjoyed it, or being stoned either. Yet as a kid, that’s what we did, until we either grew out of it or went on to addiction.
My BFF is a bartender. She is a smoker but not a drinker, although she used to be. Nearly all of the people who are regulars at her bar are lifelong alcoholics. They don’t like to drink alone and the quarantine was bad for them. Her bar makes almost all of its money on the liquor sales, as opposed to the food–they serve bar food like burgers and french fries. I’m guessing that one of the reasons the cities and towns are so reluctant to close their bars entirely is because they’d go out of business.
koshersalaami
11/20/2020 @ 10:11 am
Of course they are staying open to avoid going out of business. Around here what I’ve noticed is that a lot of the best affordable food is bar food. I think here bars are mostly more reliable than diners for good food. Still, I think they make their money on drinks, even when renowned for their food. A local bar I play music in in better times has wings, but serious enough that there are trophies in the bar with buffalos on the top from buffalo wing contests in Buffalo. And yes, they are that good. Still, from my observation, they sell way, way more drinks. (I’ve been comped on wings a couple of times. The bar owner likes my playing.)
Drinking is really a thing. It tends not to be big among Jews, Mrs. Dukakis aside, but it seems to be so important to a lot of people. I enjoy a little but if I didn’t have any it wouldn’t be a significant deprivation. I haven’t been high since at least the early eighties, possibly the late seventies. Again, never needed it, and made me feel fuzzy the next day, so I limited smoking (when offered) to Friday and Saturday nights so I wouldn’t have to work like that.