A lot of ethical thought can be boiled down to a simple maxim: Do the right thing the right way. Sounds a bit like the Golden Rule and the Two Great Commandments.
Why is the method as important as the objective? Because The Creator is not a pragmatist. The end in Biblical terms, never justifies the means. The God of the Bible cares about the whole picture and all people. He cares about those people in the center of the picture as well as those in the background and the margins. The rules He sets up governing human behavior are the rules that work best. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
This is the underlying premise of “equal protection” under the law. Everyone is supposed to answer to the same set of standards. No one is above the law. There are no kings or dictators here. Unless…we have an outbreak of coronavirus. Then some of us become much less equal than others.
So how would Donald Trump or Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio like it if their businesses were arbitrarily closed on a 12-hour notice? How come they get to come out of their houses when they are telling anyone over 65 to stay in theirs? How would they like to lose their jobs or their two jobs and be told “the government will make it up to you”?
Millions of Americans have laid down their lives to secure the rule of law and the right to vote for all people. Millions have frozen to death, bled to death, charged hills, been machine-gunned down or lost at sea or died of disease for the sake of America. For our sake. So when Ohio Governor Mike DeWine shuts down an election by dictate of the Ohio Department of Health — something very Un-American is happening here. Then the Governor made a farce out of the whole process by crafting a phony lawsuit and suing his own state to stop an unfair election. The Ohio Courts threw out this embarrassing attempt and told the Governor to go back to the rule of law. Ask the Ohio Legislature to move the date the Court ruled. The General Assembly is the only body that has the authority to change an election.
The Governor cancelled the election anyways. He cares more about people’s health than anyone else in the state and now he decides the rules.
Governor DeWine, President Trump and many others are telling us we don’t understand. Then TEACH US what you know that we do not. But they have no time for that. Is it because they think we are too stupid to understand? Or is it because they are so busy saving lives they don’t have time to explain? Or is it because they don’t understand what they are doing other than trusting “the experts in the lab coats”?
There are serious questions that remain about this virus and the extreme strategies being used by the government. Yes, this virus is a serious danger. Yes, we must protect lives. But the questions must be raised: “Is the virus the ONLY danger? Can we win the battle over the coronavirus and lose our liberty in the process?”
Watch what the “experts” and the media do with those who dare to question the politicians and their lab-coated agents. Will they answer the real science-based questions? Will they be willing to take the right steps to do the right thing, the right way, even if it requires a bit more work ? Or have they grown so used to the spotlight and the fame of power that they no longer have time to explain to the voters, the workers, the “little people” who are getting killed out here not by the coronavirus but by politicians using the end to justify the means.
There is something happening here and it is clearly not very American.