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What’s helpful during this crisis

Commentary

Without truckers, UPS and Fed Ex, what would keep food on the shelves and other vital products delivered? They keep the lifelines of society from breaking down. You have to include the farmers on that one for sure. This is just the short list. It is helpful to thank them and especially the medical professionals working tirelessly and sacrificially in this critical situation.

It is not helpful to be short-tempered and harsh with those working in grocery stores trying to keep up with customer demands for produce, meat and other groceries.

It is helpful to know history for showing us how our ancestors endured far worse than we did. It is not helpful to be void of historical perspective.

It is helpful to discern how the Big Government “bug” infects Americans worse than the coronavirus. It is not helpful to just assume, like Dennis Prager warns, that the expertise of experts is common sense, prophetic or wisdom.

It is helpful to ask, as Prager does, if shutting down America is worth the moral price. It is not helpful for Gov. Andrew Cuomo to say that extreme measures are worth it for just saving one life. What keeps him, then, from saving one life by reducing the state speed limit to 35 and closing abortion clinics?

It is helpful to have common sense precautions heeded during this outbreak, but it is not helpful to have a “one-size-fits-all” policy as if what’s good for a major city, like New York, is good for rural counties, like Chautauqua.

It is helpful to focus on the problem at the epi-centers (geography and demographic) of the virus. It is not helpful to be fixated on models of the epi-curve.

It is helpful for the press to ask good questions, such as “Dr. Fauci, would you prescribe hydroxychloroquine to your family member in critical condition from Covid-19?” It is not helpful for members of the agenda-driven media to stupidly ask, “Mr. President, don’t you feel that saying ‘China virus’ is racist?”

It is helpful, as Liz Wheeler of One America News does, to distinguish those who died due only to the virus from those who died with the virus. It is not helpful to disregard that distinction in applying halting government policies on life.

It is helpful to have red-tape and regulations slashed so that the work, especially in the private sector, can be expedited to produce effective treatment, vaccines and expanded care. It is not helpful to have state-controlled Certificate of Need (CON) restricting hospitals, resources, equipment and personnel, like New York does, nor is it helpful to have 95 percent of our antibiotics produced in China, in addition to a vast percentage of our pharmaceuticals.

It is helpful not to panic. It is not helpful for politicians to resort to panic spending.

It is helpful to have government reimburse businesses and wage earners who were forced to close by order of the government. It is not helpful for the government to give cash handouts of $1,000-plus to those already on welfare and those who have had no loss in salary or wages during the virus outbreak.

It is helpful to retain our sense of humor. It is not helpful to treat COVID-19 as a joke.

It is helpful for the religious community to work ecumenically, if you will, to prevent the spread of the virus and to assist in covering needs. It is not helpful as evangelicals to join in with a divisive ecumenical prayer to an undefined god of whatever in the heresy of ecumenicism. Better, then, not to pray than to pray.

It is helpful to have the National Day of Prayer proclaimed by the President, as well as the Gerry Free Methodist Church encouraging us to “pray only on days that end with ‘y.'” It is not helpful for leftist politician Rashida Tlaib to tweet “(Expletive) the National Day of Prayer.”

It is helpful to stockpile compassion. It is not helpful to hoard food, hand sanitizer, and toilet paper.

It is helpful to know that the latest statistics on God’s sovereignty remains at 100%. It is not helpful to hopelessly view this virus as if there is no God.

How are we helping and how are we not helping?

The Rev. Mel McGinnis is a Frewsburg resident.

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