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“I would rather die of the virus than of hunger,” says Karina Ribullen as she sells surgical masks and coffee in the open-air market of La Parada on the Colombian-Venezuelan border. “If I miss a day of work, my family doesn’t eat. It’s not bravery, it’s desperation.”

Ribullen isn’t alone. Like most of working-class Latin America, the 46-year-old woman doesn’t have savings; she lives hand to mouth working informally in the streets. She pays rent by the day in a shared apartment with her two daughters, ages 10 and 19, and her granddaughter, age 2. They have received no assistance from either the Venezuelan or Colombian governments. Left without another option, she defies a federally mandated lockdown to earn enough money to support her family.

The COVID-19 crisis has presented much of Latin America with an impossible choice: Continue enforcing draconian lockdown methods much stricter than those in the United States while risking economic collapse, or end the protective measures and risk overwhelming critically vulnerable health systems.

Making the dilemma even more painful, the global fall of oil prices is likely to send the oil-dependent economies of Venezuela, Colombia, and Ecuador into severe regional economic depression. Some experts warn of a looming regional debt crisis as governments find themselves unable to meet their payment obligations.

Meanwhile, a ravaged Latin American working class reels from 6 weeks of an economic freeze. Normal work is on hold, governments have been slow or unable to deliver emergency protections, and unrest is growing.

On April 23 in Upata, Venezuela, hungry protesters raided shops and open-air markets in riots that were put down violently by police and armed gangs. Hunger-driven protests have since spread to more than 15 Venezuelan cities, as acute gasoline shortages make food distribution more difficult and as the global crisis worsens an already astronomical inflation.

In Colombia, there are nearly nightly protests. In the southern neighborhoods of the capital, Bogotá, vulnerable citizens have taken to hanging red cloths in their windows as a call for help and a symbol of growing hunger.

The World Bank’s April report on Latin America predicts a 3–4 percent drop in GDP across the region, adding that the impact could be worse if oil stays weak. It further warns that a depressed economy could lead to a return to the broad social unrest of 2019, when mass protests swept the region. South America might not be able to endure a frozen economy for much longer.

Sergio Guzman is an analyst and director at Colombia Risk Analysis, a consultancy and political risk assessment group. “The [Colombian] government is caught between a rock and hard place,” he says. “People are running on fumes. Unless the government can restart the economy soon, they will be facing an even more severe long-term downturn, and that puts vulnerable people even more at risk.”

In all of Latin America, low-income communities are more at risk as they are often forced to resume work informally or go hungry. Wealthier individuals are more likely to both support and obey lockdown measures, as they have savings and resources that allow them to survive the freeze.

“The potential for unrest is very high,” says Guzman. “People’s hunger is growing, and it is translating into anger with police forces and the government. The crisis is increasing Colombians’ awareness that government institutions aren’t up to the task of dealing with this situation.”

Eighty percent of Colombia’s export market is driven by petroleum and mineral extraction, and both foreign and domestic companies are already pulling back on investment as weakened oil prices make exploration unprofitable. In an economy whose currency has shown a strong correlation with oil prices, this exacerbates an already looming recession. As inflation increases, a weakened Colombian peso means payments on a foreign debt ledgered in dollars becomes a heavier burden, and economic contraction becomes more painful.

The impact of the coming economic contraction will cut across all strata of society. “It isn’t a matter of only affecting the wealthy,” says Mathew Smith, an economic analyst and journalist in Medellin. “It means double-digit unemployment, collapse of small businesses, government rollback of spending on social programs like health and education, and a rise in crime in a region where the rate is already high.”

Ecuador has been the Latin American nation hit hardest by COVID-19. Official government statistics report 506 deaths, but the local press has been claiming for weeks that the actual number is far higher. A recent New York Times study suggests the actual number may be 15 times larger. The city of Guayaquil was so overwhelmed that citizens left bodies on the streets and cemeteries were forced to use shared graves.

The economic freeze has cost the country an estimated $4.7 billion in sales, plus an unknown amount in lost oil revenue and investment. The government defaulted on its most recent foreign debt payment due to a lack of liquidity, downgrading its international credit rating. Tourism has plummeted, leaving millions economically paralyzed.

The Ecuadorian government has announced plans to slowly reopen the economy while maintaining social distancing measures. The state of the economy has left them little choice.

Colombia has announced plans to maintain its strict lockdown until at least May 11, though some businesses that have been deemed essential will begin to open this week. Local and federal officials have been at odds over how and when to formally restart the economy, with President Iván Duque pushing to open more quickly. He is opposed by a vocal group of mayors and governors. 

Venezuela has reacted to ongoing shortages by announcing plans to nationalize sectors of the food industry and implement price controls—a strategy that has worsened both inflation and smuggling in the past, as Venezuelan farmers chose to sell their goods in Colombia rather than in government-mandated markets.

As these countries weigh their limited options, officials fear that resuming normal life too soon may result in a loss of life and increased hardship. But for the most vulnerable citizens, like Ribullen, waiting too long could have a disastrously similar effect.

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Today the Supreme Court decided Georgia v. Public Resource.Org, Inc. The Court held that under the government edicts doctrine, the annotations beneath the statutory provisions in the Official Code of Georgia Annotated are ineligible for copyright protection. My co-blogger noted the unusual 5-4 voting alignment. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the majority opinion, joined by the four most junior justices: Sotomayor, Kagan, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh. Justices Thomas dissented, joined by Justice Alito, and in part, by Justice Breyer. Justice Ginsburg wrote a separate dissent, joined by Justice Breyer.

The majority and dissent disagreed on many points. For example, was it relevant that the annotations lacked the “force of law”? Chief Justice Roberts concluded this factor was not relevant. Why? Because concurrences and dissents, which also lack the “force of law,” cannot be copyrighted. The Chief explained:

Banks, following Wheaton and the “judicial consensus” it inspired, denied copyright protection to judicial opinions without excepting concurrences and dissents that carry no legal force. 128 U. S., at 253 (emphasis deleted). As every judge learns the hard way, “comments in [a] dissenting opinion” about legal principles and precedents “are just that: comments in a dissenting opinion.” Railroad Retirement Bd. v. Fritz, 449 U. S. 166, 177, n. 10 (1980). Yet such comments are covered by the government edicts doctrine because they come from an official with authority to make and interpret the law.

Here is the full quote from Footnote 10 of Railroad Retirement Bd. v. Fritz (1980):

The comments in the dissenting opinion about the proper cases for which to look for the correct statement of the equal protection rational-basis standard, and about which cases limit earlier cases, are just that: comments in a dissenting opinion.

Roberts may have some personal familiarity with this case. Justice Rehnquist wrote the majority opinion in December 1980. At the time, a young John Roberts was his law clerk.

Justice Thomas vigorously disagreed with the majority on this point:

The majority finds it meaningful, for instance, that Banks prohibited dissents and concurrences from being copyrighted, even though they carry no legal force. Ante, at 15. At an elementary level, it is true that the judgment is the only part of a judicial decision that has legal effect. But it blinks reality to ignore that every word of a judicial opinion—whether it is a majority, a concurrence, or a dissent—expounds upon the law in ways that do not map neatly on to the legislative function. Setting aside summary decisions, the reader of a judicial opinion will always gain critical insight into the reasoning underlying a judicial holding by reading all opinions in their entirety.

Thomas further explained his viewed in footnote 6, which Justice Breyer dissented from:

Understanding the reasoning that animates the rule in turn provides pivotal insight into how the law will likely be applied in future judicial opinions.⁶

⁶For instance, this Court has not overruled Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U. S. 602 (1971), which pronounced a test for evaluating EstablishmentClause claims. But a reader would do well to carefully scrutinize the various opinions in American Legion v. American Humanist Assn., 588 U. S. ___ (2019), to understand the markedly different way that this precedent functions in our current jurisprudence compared to when it was first decided. Moreover, sometimes a separate writing takes on canonical status, like Justice Jackson’s concurrence regarding the executive power in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579, 634–638 (1952) (opinion concurring in judgment and opinion of the Court); see also Katz v. United States, 389 U. S. 347, 360–361 (1967) (Harlan, J.,concurring) (reasonable expectation of privacy Fourth Amendment test). Still other times, the reasoning in an opinion for less than a majority of the Court provides the explicit basis for a later majority’s holding. See, e.g., McKinney v. Arizona, 589 U. S. ___, ___ (2020) (slip op., at 5) (discussing Ring v. Arizona, 536 U. S. 584, 612 (2002) (Scalia J., concurring)); Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U. S. 97, 102 (1976) (incorporating into the majority the Eighth Amendment “evolving standards of decency” test first announced in Trop v. Dulles, 356 U. S. 86, 101 (1958) (plurality opinion)). Even ” ‘comments in [a] dissenting opinion,’ ” ante, at 15, sometimes reemerge as the foundational reasoning in a majority opinion. See, e.g., Franchise Tax Bd. of Cal. v. Hyatt, 587 U. S. ___ (2019) (discussing Nevada v. Hall, 440 U. S. 410, 433–439 (1979) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting)); Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U. S. 558, 578 (2003) (“JUSTICE STEVENS‘ [dissenting] analysis, in our view, should have been controlling in Bowers  [v. Hardwick, 478 U. S. 186 (1986),] and should control here”). These examples, and myriad more, demonstrate that the majority treats the role of separate judicial opinions in an overly simplistic fashion.

Justice Thomas, who is often in dissent, may a different vantage point than the Chief.

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“You’ve met with a terrible fate, haven’t you?” So begins Link’s adventure in the creepily off-kilter land of Termina, the setting of The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, which was released in Japan 20 years ago today.

Two years ago, when The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time turned 20, I hailed it as perhaps the greatest video game ever created. It seems only fair, then, to give the beloved game’s twisted sequel its due: Majora’s Mask polarized the masses, but it’s the favorite of hardcore Zelda fans. Strangest of all—and there’s a lot that’s strange about this trip—Link’s adventure in Termina is bizarrely relevant to the grim situation so much of the world finds itself in right now: the coronavirus pandemic.

Majora’s Mask is a surprisingly sophisticated, lyrical meditation on the theme of coping with one’s own mortality. It forces players to consider what the sudden, unexpected end of civilization would look like at the micro level: for a mailman who’s run out of time to deliver his last letter, for the frustrated director of a theater troupe, for a lonely dairy farmer, and so on. Sometimes the hero doesn’t save the world. Sometimes there are no good outcomes. Sometimes it’s simply too late.

Indeed, Majora’s Mask subverts one of the quintessential video game tropes from its outset. There is no princess in need of rescuing: Zelda, the titular damsel in distress, appears only briefly in a flashback. Having purged evil from the land in the previous installment, protagonist Link thinks he’s getting out of the world-saving business and is ready for some personal time. The battle against the forces of darkness obliged Link to grow up too fast, Zelda fears, and thus she releases him to recapture his youth, on a quest to reconnect with a missing friend whose identity is never confirmed.

Link travels to a familiar forest, and follows a horse thief through a door to a parallel dimension. Majora’s Mask owes a great debt to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland: Link enters the looking glass and falls into a world that’s a mirror image of the one he knows so well. Termina is populated with familiar faces—the game, which runs on the same engine as Ocarina, reuses many of the same sprites—but none of them know Link.

At first they hardly notice him. They have their own problems: The moon is expected to crash into Termina and obliterate all life in just three days.

It soon becomes clear that this is the doing of a mischievous imp called the Skull Kid, who resembles a scarecrow with a bird’s beak. The Skull Kid has stolen Majora’s Mask, and unless Link can return the item to its elusive owner, the Happy Mask Salesman, the world will end.

That all sounds like straightforward hero-saves-the-world stuff, but three days later, Link fails. And then he fails again. And again, and again. Each time he can use his magic ocarina to travel backward three days. The merchant from whom the mask was stolen greets Link with the line: “You’ve met with a terrible fate, haven’t you?” He encourages Link to try harder next time.

“Everything you do is marked by failure, by bad luck, by not having enough time to get everything done,” observed The AV Club‘s Anthony John Agnello in a 2015 review of the game’s remake for the Nintendo 3DS. “That pervasive air of cruel indifference from the world permeates the game.”

That’s a basic overview, but one that only begins to hint at the singular weirdness of playing Majora’s Mask. A long list of horrors awaits Link: a tree with a pained expression, later revealed to be a runaway son deformed and murdered by the Skull Kid; the ghost of a hero who died in an avalanche; a farm beset by alien (yes, alien) abductions. The game’s rigid schedule makes the horror more real. If Link visits the park north of town on the first night—and only the first night—he can save an old woman from a mugging. If he fails, he must buy her purloined goods from the pawn shop on night two. There’s a haunted house on a forlorn beach, but Link has to cleanse it before the third day, at which point the owner loses interest. It hardly matters, because everything resets when Link travels back through time at the end of the three-day cycle. Visit the town’s laundry pool at just the right moment, and a circus performer will confess that a fit of jealousy caused him to steal a magic artifact from the circus’s leader: a dog. “Why was the dog the leader??” the perplexed performer wonders. Why, indeed?

This is a fantastical game that bears little resemblance to anything from the worlds of fantasy, and the game’s visual style and musical cues reinforces the theme of dread. The townsfolk are pointy humanoids with exaggerated smiles and frowns. The swamp’s color scheme is green and purple, giving it an unwell feeling. The background music gradually intensifies as time marches on, and the last five minutes of the third day produce a cacophony of bells and sorrowful sounds. Even the upbeat tunes have a note of understated sadness to them.

It’s the little people who make Majora’s Mask so memorable. Link learns their routines, their secrets, and their fears. He’s there for them as they begrudgingly come to terms with what’s about to happen, whether it’s witnessing a last-minute declaration of love, conducting a final orchestra performance, or comforting customers at the local bar as the world ends. (The bar’s patrons drink milk—this is, after all, a kid’s game.) Sometimes, Link learns, the best thing you can do for people is be honest with them. Real heroes don’t magically solve everybody’s problems. They listen, they empathize, they offer companionship. For helping them cope with their pain, Link’s new friends each give him a token of remembrance: a mask. These masks represent the folks of Termina letting go of their fears and bracing for the inevitable.

It’s not exactly a spoiler to reveal that in the end, Link sets some things right. Still, the conclusion is bittersweet at best, and it’s not clear whether Link ever does find his missing friend—or whether he survives his ordeal in Termina at all. (Termina, of course, means “end.”) Two decades later, the game feels grimly familiar, and not just because everyone is wearing a mask.

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The dynamism of the emerging private space industry, with its eye-popping aircraft designs and new approaches to launches, is rejuvenating excitement around space travel. Once monopolized by a budget-busting federal bureaucracy, space travel now has new leaders: wealthy philanthropists with boyhood dreams of spaceflight, and entrepreneurs who believe that they can make money selling tickets to the edge of space.

When Reason first declared the “dawn of private ventures in space” in 1979, we were admittedly off by a number of years. But in the last decade, billionaires such as Elon Musk, Richard Branson, and Jeff Bezos have been working through costly failures and lengthy experiments to arrive at workable approaches to commercial spaceflight. In 2019 investors poured a record $5.8 billion into hundreds of space ventures.

“Even though the industry, the world, all the primes, all the governments had concluded that it’s impossible to reuse rocket boosters, [Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos] took enormous risks and try it anyway,” says famed aerospace engineer Burt Rutan. “And you know, they all crashed at first and kept crashing. But wow, they figured it out! And now, by reusing rocket boosters, it changes the entire outlook on what’s going to happen for the public as far as flying in space.”

Rutan, who won the Reason Foundation’s 2019 Savas Award for Privatization, designed SpaceShipOne, the first reusable manned craft to reach space not underwritten by the government. He sat down with Reason Editor-in-Chief Katherine Mangu-Ward to discuss private space flight, his renegade aircraft designs, and why it’s important for mankind to leave Earth. Rutan, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and the rest of the SpaceShipOne team won the $10 million Ansari X Prize as the first non-government organization to launch a reusable manned spacecraft into space twice within two weeks.

“Elon Musk has said that that what he’s doing on rocketry is a hundred times more important than curing cancer,” says Rutan. “If you cure cancer, you save 14 percent of the people. If you can colonize another planet—and humans can learn to survive there—you can save all of us.”

Edited and graphics by Meredith Bragg; cameras by Jim Epstein and Kevin Alexander.

Photos: Mark Greenberg/ZUMA Press/Newscom, ARCOCCHI GIULIO/SIPA/Newscom, Paul Hennessy/ZUMA Press/Newscom, SMG/ZUMA Press/Newscom, Blue Origin/Cover Images/Newscom, Yichuan Cao/ZUMA Press/Newscom, Ben Cawthra/Sipa USA/Newscom

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