Some things are becoming clear in the midst of this crisis. For example, I think it is clear that two things are really hurting the country. One is COVID-19. We’ve been reporting on the challenges faced by hospitals, healthcare workers, and those in places like New York City. 

But there is growing evidence that the “coronavirus panic,” stoked by the left, their media allies, and the advocates of big government, is also hurting the country, perhaps even more than the disease itself. 

I have no doubt that there is a growing epidemic of despair — drug addiction, depression, domestic violence, and suicide — caused by the economic ruin that is occurring right now. I fear the grim toll from this panic is going to be much greater than the toll from this virus. 

According to Johns Hopkins University, we passed 22,000 deaths in the United States today. That’s close to the toll from an average flu season. I want to remind you again that just two years ago, the U.S. flu season resulted in 60,000 deaths, which at this point we may not hit with the coronavirus. 

So how worried are you about getting the virus? I know my anxiety level is up. But when we look at reality, should the average American be as afraid as most appear to be? 

My old friend and colleague Bill Bennett said this morning that he reviewed the statistics and they showed that the average American has a two-tenths of 1% chance of getting the virus. And if you do, you have a 98% chance of recovering. For this we shut down the entire country?!

But wait… It gets worse.

Fighting for Faith

On Good Friday, Gov. Andy Beshear ordered Kentucky’s churches to close. Beshear added that the state would record the license plates of anyone at a large gathering over Easter weekend and report individuals to local health departments so they could be quarantined for 14 days — akin to being sentenced to home arrest.

When one church got creative, announcing it would hold an Easter service in its parking lot with worshippers staying in their cars, Greg Fischer, the mayor of Louisville, went a step further. He banned all gatherings of any kind in churches, public places, and even in homes. 

So, the church went to court and got an injunction against Fischer’s order banning drive-in services. U.S. District Judge Justin Walker blasted the mayor’s order as “stunning” and “beyond all reason [and] unconstitutional.” Walker wrote:

On Holy Thursday, an American mayor criminalized the communal celebration of Easter. That sentence is one that this Court never expected to see outside the pages of a dystopian novel, or perhaps the pages of [the satirical publication] The Onion.

In other places, Easter worshippers were hit with $500 fines.

It’s very revealing to see how quickly and almost enthusiastically some left-wing politicians have decided that churches and synagogues are nonessential and must be shut down, while abortion clinics, liquor stores, and lottery retailers can stay open. 

I’m pleased to report that Attorney General William Barr warned over the weekend that the Justice Department will be taking action against local officials who violated the First Amendment. But this is also an example of just how thin the line is against those who want to take away religious liberty. 

If we didn’t have Donald Trump and Mike Pence in the White House, if we didn’t have their conservative judges and William Barr at the Justice Department, if we hadn’t had groups like Focus on the Family, Family Research Council, and Campaign for Working Families fighting for faith, family, and freedom for the past 20 years, we would have lost this battle a long time ago.

Mixed Messages

President Trump and Vice President Pence are doing their best to get us to the point where we can begin a rolling reopening of America. Yet, it is as clear as the nose on your face that the political left and their media allies are going to be united in opposition. 

Their message seems to be: “Trump waited too long to close everything, and now he’s moving too quickly to open everything up.”

If these dual messages take root, it will result in what the left wants, which is the defeat of the Trump/Pence administration this November, and the people we saw gleefully shutting churches this weekend taking control of the federal government and all its powers. 

If totalitarianism and dictatorship ever come to America, it won’t be from the conservative right, but from the big government, anti-faith, socialist left. One more thing to remember in November.

Fighting for Life

Last week, former Clinton adviser James Carville said that Republicans “will kill people to stay in power, literally.” Carville was upset that Wisconsin’s primary election took place as scheduled. Presumably, he would have been happier if democracy had been suspended.

Left-wing commentator John Heilemann said that tens of thousands of Americans are going to die from the coronavirus “because of Donald Trump’s incompetence and lack of leadership.”

This is beyond disgusting. It is pure demagoguery. And I hope Joe Biden brings it up during one of the presidential debates because the answer now and then is the same. 

This demagoguery is coming from a party that is absolutely committed to increasing the number of abortions every year. It has even insisted that the “choice” to kill an unborn baby is enshrined in the Constitution. It is not. Joe Biden even wants you to subsidize abortion on demand with your hard-earned tax dollars.

Democrats like Carville and Heilemann have no right to accuse anyone of being too cavalier about human life. Their whole party is based on the right to kill the innocent. And that one issue is why the left will do anything to smear conservative judges like Brett Kavanaugh.