Nothing lets the veil slip to reveal the enthusiastic power grabs of blue state governors quite like pandemic panic, or so it seems. Americans all over the US are protesting these increasingly tyrannical restrictions on basically every activity on which America defined itself.

Take Governor Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, for instance, who banned purchasing seeds and paint, since they declared non-essential goods, and then banned gatherings of any sort while forcing her constituency into social isolation. Scary times indeed, but the question remains: what are we afraid of, a virus, or a fascist police state. Other benevolent blue states have called on citizens to report their neighbors for breaking quarantine rules, and even outlawed fishing.

Governor Whitmer, for her part, has promised—as an incentive for being good little kids—that if the citizens of Michigan could stop making her job as dictator in chief so hard she might consider lifting the bans for a day during the 4th of July holiday, giving her constituency a chance to momentarily enjoy what so many Americans fought and died for—freedom from tyrannical despots. But she will only agree to these terms under the condition that everyone stays inside, wear their masks, and for the love of all that’s holy they don’t invite anyone over, or especially go to church.

In my day, they called this kind of freakish authoritarian power grab “paternalism” but judging by the lockstep nature of all these blue state rules, all one can determine is that perhaps—fascism is so hot right now.

Let’s hope governor Whitmer doesn’t have to punish her millions of Michigan kids any further and she allows them to enjoy the freedom their ancestors died for with a temporary lockdown lift to celebrate Independence Day.