"It's time for Americans to get back to work and fill our great downtowns again," President Joe Biden said during his State of the Union address on March 1. "People working from home can feel safe to begin to return to the office."
Months have passed, but Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) refuses to take the president's advice. The leading Democrat announced on Friday that House members could continue to work from home and vote remotely until June 28, at which point she will consider an additional extension.
Pelosi, who is best known for violating COVID restrictions to get her hair done at a fancy salon and flaunting her $24,000 freezer stocked with $12 pints of luxury ice cream as ordinary Americans struggled to make ends meet, previously extended the remote working period on March 28, four weeks after Biden's remarks.
A Washington Free Beacon investigation found that as of March 18, many Democratic offices on Capitol Hill and throughout the country remained closed. In April, the Free Beacon reported that Senate cafeteria workers were at risk of losing their jobs because so many Democrats refused to show up to work. Unlike Pelosi's colleagues in the House, however, senators are still required to vote in person.
The day before Pelosi announced the extension of the remote working period, the Washington Post published an astonishing opinion piece by Zeke Emanuel, the former Obama health care adviser, a.k.a. "the architect of Obamacare," who serves on Biden's COVID-19 advisory board.
Emanuel, 64, has written that he hopes to die at the age of 75. In his article for the Post, the so-called health expert urged Americans to stop acting like the COVID-19 pandemic is over. "This conventional wisdom is gravely wrong," he wrote. "I will continue to wear my N95 mask, limit my air and train travel, and avoid eating at indoor restaurants." In essence, he argued that such measures should remain in place until our nation's health experts can figure out what the hell is going on with "long COVID" and the small percentage of patients who continue to report symptoms more than four weeks after being infected.
So much for living life to the fullest. Josh Barro, a prominent Biden supporter, said Emanuel's article was "just another reflection of how public health people are weirdos." (Fact check: True.)