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We have been watching with some dawning horror as political discourse has increasingly turned towards the concept of acceptable losses.
The Democrats, obsessed with trying to understand how they could possibly lose to Trump twice, are edging steadily closer towards throwing away vulnerable minority groups, which will continue to need protecting for as long as we, as a people and a nation, are unwilling to put our actions where our mouths are with regards to equality.
Meanwhile, the Republicans are frantically looking to smash whatever they can of the federal bureaucracy while they can in the lead-up to a 2026 election that they have every expectation will go poorly for them, based on historical precedent. This move-fast-and-worry-about-consequences-later approach is having steadily more impact on other vulnerable populations, such as those whose regions need propped up by the federal government financially (which is most of rural America), or those who are reliant on experimental cures for complicated cancers.
Democrats and Republicans can rejoice that they finally have something politically in common, apparently: members of both parties are discovering within themselves the willingness to cast off people who are reliant upon them.
Sure, Democrats can argue that winning elections is more important than this or that minority or this or that culture issue.
Sure, Republicans can argue that the federal debt -- and Trump's tax cuts -- are worth the cost of losing our national scientific advantage and maybe some people who might be considered terminally ill anyway.
But this is horrible.
Maybe this is some kind of generational cultural difference, but we were raised that, when times are tough, you get tougher; that when even one person needs help or protection, you do just it, even if it comes at a cost to the whole.
We don't believe in sacrificing people for the majority. We were taught better than that, and we sincerely hope that we are not alone in that opinion.
In a story in yesterday's edition of The Express, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. was questioned by bipartisan members of Congress about some of the impacts of his policies. In that story was this account:
"One Washington state mother, Natalie, has faced delays in treatment for stage 4 cancer at the National Institutes of Health's Clinical Center, said Democratic Sen. Patty Murray. The clinical center is the research-only hospital commonly known as the "House of Hope," but when Murray asked Kennedy to explain how many jobs have been lost there, he could not answer. The president's budget proposes a nearly $20 billion slash from the NIH."
There's another word for these types of acceptable losses: eugenics.
We know people here -- many of them our readers -- are better than this.
We see, day in and day out, the kindness and capacity for care that members of our community have, especially for those who have suffered tragedy or are struggling with illness.
Consider the recent -- and continuing -- outpouring of support for Amanda Geisewite following the nightmarish wrong-way crash on Route 220, which killed her husband and her unborn child.
Consider that Mill Hall Elementary raised over $1,000 for a third-grader diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma and the amount of support that "Tucker's Tribe" has been providing.
These are just two examples at the very forefront of our minds amidst an endless sea. This happens constantly, both here in Lock Haven and elsewhere throughout rural America -- and, yes, urban America, too.
People may be inherently good, or they may not -- a philosophical debate that every person will give you a different answer on.
But whether people are generally good or not, we believe that standing by the weak, sick, tired, hungry and poor is an American virtue. Our empathy and ability to care for one another and build each other up is crucial to what has made us one of -- if not the -- greatest nations on Earth.
Some Democrats may argue that this is who we have always been, historically.
But regardless of whether that is true or not, what matters now is who we are today, not who we were yesterday. We profess to be a culture of second chances -- and sometimes third, fourth or more.
We should extend that same grace to ourselves.
Yes, we have some problems. The debt needs chopped down and belts need tightened to make that happen. Business needs to be freed somewhat from needlessly burdensome regulations. Educators need to focus on teaching our children how to think for themselves -- with an emphasis on reading, writing, history and math.
And so forth.
At the same time, however, we need to stop rationalizing our growing willingness to sacrifice the less fortunate.
Life isn't fair, fundamentally. And while we absolutely should want to encourage people to work hard for their own successes, we should remember that all of us are just a few bad hours away from needing the safety net so many wish to strip from others.
There is a way to be both responsible and caring, and we need to urge our elected officials to find that path. And, in the mean time, we need to bushwhack it ourselves, in our own lives and community.
We would all do well to be slow to judge and quick to help. It is bad enough that the gears of power care little for the helpless and maligned -- we should not be trying to make it worse.