“Your money or your life.”
In movies that’s what thieves say to people they are robbing. It’s a false choice because they often take your money and then kill you anyway, but that’s another story.
The point I want to make is that Trump and his Republicans have come up with a new version of the phrase – “My money or your life.”
That’s the choice Trump et al. are putting to us in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
When asked this week about risking people’s lives by pushing to open the economy, Trey Hollingsworth (R-IN) responded by saying, “It is policymakers’ decision to put on our big boy and big girl pants and say, ‘This is the lesser of these two evils. And it is not zero evil, but it is the lesser of these evils, and we intend to move forward in that direction.’ That is our responsibility, and to abdicate that is to insult the Americans that voted us into office.”
I wonder what some of his constituents who voted him into office thought about what he said. I would think finding out the person you voted for thinks you’re expendable would be a bit sobering.
That’s how Trump and the Republicans are thinking these days. If people are going to go back to work soon, we just have to accept the reality that some people are expendable.
In other words, we have to choose between people working and people dying.
It’s kind of like the old ethical game where there are five people in a boat that will support only three and the group has to decide which two get thrown overboard.
It’s a terrible choice to have to make, one you would do anything to keep from having to make.
Not Trump or Republicans like him. They are ready and anxious to make it, even though it’s a false choice. The truth is, Democratic governors (and two Republicans in Ohio and Maryland) want people to get back to work as much as Trump does.
But for him and Republicans like Hollingsworth, it’s not about putting people back to work responsibly, allowing the medical experts to guide the process. It’s about getting the economy going whatever the cost to human life.
It’s choosing money over lives, dollars over health, dollars over safety, dollars over hospital capacity, dollars over the lives of healthcare professionals.
This is war, Trump says, only just like he did when he faced having to go Vietnam, he wants someone else put their lives on the line.
Well, I’m with Governor Andrew Cuomo who said to Trump, “My mother is not expendable and your mother is not expendable and our brothers and sisters are not expendable and we’re not going to accept a premise that human life is disposable and we’re not going to put a dollar figure on human life.”
Does Governor Cuomo want to get New Yorkers back to work? Of course, he does. Don’t be stupid. Every governor does. Every mayor does. Everyone does.
But not at any price.
The idea that health officials are standing in the way of opening up the economy is typical Donald Trump creating division where there is none.
I think I hate this man, though I am not sure what that feels like since I don’t recall ever feeling this way before.
I for sure hate his failure to lead our country effectively through this critical time. We have never seen such incompetence at this level of leadership.
Making matters worse, Trump’s narcissism is behind every decision he makes, so much so that it is enough to make you throw-up. I simply cannot believe he insisted on having his name on stimulus checks. That’s just sick.
Sane Americans who live in states with governors who care about them more than they care about pleasing Trump are fortunate.
I am thankful I live in such a state and can trust that our governor will be guided by sound medical advice rather than political expediency as he weighs what to do in balancing the economy with the virus threat.
Millions of Americans are not as fortunate, and they will suffer under governors who want to please Trump more than protect them and have bought into the false choice between the economy and people’s health, between money and someone’s life.
We all want to get back to work, but not if it prematurely puts people’s lives at risk.
At this point, we cannot trust that Trump and most Republicans won’t, believing as they do that some of us are expendable.
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