I have always viewed the Declaration of Independence as America’s most important document. While The Constitution has more relevance today as a legal document, to me The Declaration more fundamentally reflects what America stands for. It wasn’t born out of compromise like The Constitution, but out of necessity and bravery in the face of danger. It was a declaration of our desire to place freedom, equality, and a life of dignity above the desires of the unaccountable rich and powerful (back then, the King of England).

The Declaration of Independence has been our country’s guiding light in our darkest hours. Lincoln routinely used it in his legal arguments against slavery leading up to the Civil War. In the aftermath of World War Two, Eleanor Roosevelt used it to craft the Universal Declaration of Human rights in it’s image. These words, headlining this virtuous document, ring just as true today in another trying time as they did in 1776, 1858, and 1941:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness“

In fact the founders went out of their way to replace John Locke’s third right, “property” (“estate”) with “the pursuit of happiness”. As important as property rights were (and still are), this was meant to show, in no uncertain terms, that property rights and economic considerations were secondary to life and liberty.

So when Governor Cuomo says that we will not put a dollar figure on human lives, he is not engaging in partisan politics, he is getting at the core of what it means to be an American. I am not religious, but according to our founders these were rights given to people by God. It would then follow that when President Trump suggests otherwise–that potentially hundreds of thousands of lives are an acceptable cost of opening our economy back up sooner–he is playing the devil’s advocate.

Now I believe in our government and system of governance. I don’t think this will come to pass. I think Governors from both parties will undermine this order should Trump press ahead with it (in all likelihood he’ll flip flop when he sees how unpopular it has been, and try to rewrite history by claiming he never said it). Even the Federal Reserve Chair, someone who can be fired by the President and whose mandate is to promote long term economic stability and growth, made the unusual move of very publicly rejecting the President’s suggestion.

But in even suggesting this, Trump has shown who he truly is and what his priorities are (something that was apparent to me and many others from the start). Before his Presidency even started I called out his platform and style of governance for what it was–pursuing short term gains to make himself look good, while disregarding the long term costs all Americans would have to bare. Because they would occur on someone else watch Trump wouldn’t have to take the blame, and if they occurred sooner, he could just scapegoat and lie his way out of it.

For example, tax cuts to the wealthy made the economy look stronger for a bit, but will make it more difficult to address the structural issues that make our economy fundamentally unfair (“starve the beast” as the GOP calls it, so we cannot introduce new social programs to address these issues). His stance on cutting regulations and denying climate change follow a similar playbook–they increase growth in the short run, but they impose great costs on society in the long run (costs that fall disproportionately on the least well off).

On foreign policy, his decision to ease restrictions on weapon sales by turning our Commerce Dept. into the world’s largest arms dealer makes for big dollar figure headlines and plays well with his base. But by doing so, in addition to straining ties with our allies and putting Democracy and human rights promotion on the back burner, he has undoubtedly planted the seeds for future conflicts. But no problem for Trump, these conflicts will happen on someone else’s watch, and good luck definitively proving he is to blame anyways. To Trump, if you can’t prove his guilt in a court of law (in what has clearly become a broken justice system as it pertains to him), he feels exonerated and even vindicated in his actions.

The only difference now is that the cost of his proposal is immediate and direct–there is no “reasonable doubt” that opening the country back up too soon will directly lead to massive numbers of preventable deaths (although in all fairness his botched response thusfar has already accomplished that to some degree). Not like when hack economists supported his tax plan, or how hack scientists give him cover for questioning climate science. No, there is no cover here–he made those statements and now he must own them and their underlying significance. 

So Mr. Trump, my question to you is how many pawns need to be sacrificed so the modern day kings can start getting richer again? How much is a life worth? I bet if you asked Trump, he would give you an answer tied to a person’s net worth; that he even thinks there is an answer at all is the problem.

Not only is his proposal cruel and patently un-American, it would also be self defeating. Open up the economy too soon and the virus will resurge, necessitating future closings and prolonging the economic damage. The $2 trillion stimulus plan was designed to pause the economy for a couple of months to get this thing under control, not deal with multiple surges over the course of a year; Trump’s proposal would undermine the largest economic stimulus plan in American history.

We all know Trump likes to watch the stock market, but he should not expect support for his proposal to come from there either. While in normal times the stock market does reward pro-business policies regardless of their human cost, these are not normal times. The stock market responded positively to both the passage of a bill that mandated paid sick leave and a stimulus bill that is designed to help shutter the economy until this health crisis passes. These are hardly pro-business policies, but even Wall St. understands that if the health crisis is not properly and definitively addressed, there can be no true economic recovery.

It is not exactly clear who Trump is even trying to appeal to with this proposal. Do Evangelical Christians really value Easter services over human lives? Of course not. Sure, you will always get some lemmings who will follow Trump off a cliff, but really anyone with an ounce of decency or even selfish foresight can see how ill conceived his plan is.

Hopefully the adults in the room can keep this from coming to pass. I think they can–they need to. Just like with the recently passed stimulus bill people will rise to the occasion, the stakes are too high not to.

I will leave you with one last parting thought. While it is true that older people are more vulnerable to COVID-19, here is another truth about older people–they turn out to vote. So come November do us all a favor, remember the man who thought your life was worthless and vote him the hell out of office! It is past time we declare our independence from this stain on America’s character.

—

Update (4/13):

Trump, in his typical pissing-match style, has said it is up to him when to “reopen the country”. Legal experts disagree, saying that power lies with Governors, citing The Constitution.

Trump recently said he is “very serious” about opening the economy back up May 1st, something many health experts (even those within his administration) believe is unrealistic.

—

Update (3/29):

President Trump already backtracked on this claim, extending social distancing guidelines till the end of April. This is a good thing, but there is no guarantee the end of April will be the proper time. As Dr. Fauci said, “the virus determines the timeline”. Hopefully Trump continue to listen to public health experts and reassess then.

When asked about his Easter comments, Trump said they were merely “aspirational”. I’m sorry, but that is bullshit. When you are the POTUS during a national emergency and health crisis, you must speak clearly, directly, and frankly. You do not throw out “aspirational” dates to reopen the economy before the peak of cases is even reached (and, due to your administration’s failures, likely before widespread testing is even available). You don’t make comments like “the cure can’t be worse than the disease”. You don’t suggest to the American people that their lives are less important that the economy–a false choice that only a simple minded and cruel person would believe anyways):

“One can do those types of quite gruesome calculations” said MIT economist Emil Verner. But evidence suggests “that in some sense, that’s a false tradeoff,” he said. 

Verner last week co-authored a paper about the response to the 1918 flu epidemic and found that cities that restricted public gatherings sooner and longer had fewer deaths – and ultimately emerged from the pandemic with stronger economic growth.“

Sorry Trump, you don’t get off the hook for this one. For the few who did not know until you made that statement, we now all know who EXACTLY you are.