Another edition of letter oof the weak: Democrats are causing more panic

By John St. Clair | The Public Forum

Many Democrats want to keep our economy shut down for the foreseeable future. One Biden adviser suggests 18 months. Locally, Salt Lake County Mayor Jenny Wilson suggests Memorial Day. I'm sure Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall is not far behind.

Democrats seem to want to cause more panic than allay fears. We need to open up our economy as soon as possible when it's safe to do so. That could come in phases or a big bang. We cannot continue to drive our economy into the ground if we have any hope of recovery anytime soon. Saving lives matters, and so does saving our economy — they do not have to be mutually exclusive.

While the administration and Congress have done a great job in infusing money into our economy with the $2.2 trillion stimulus package, we cannot expect that the government can do everything for all people. We have to get back to normal with appropriate caution and distancing and put America back to work.

Many letter writers and Democrats seem to want to blame President Trump or Gov. Gary Herbert. They say they "should have known" how bad this pandemic was and should have acted sooner. There's a lot of blame and armchair quarterbacking going on, which solves nothing.

Folks, none of us knew how bad this virus was in the early days. No one knew how serious or catastrophic. They have taken pragmatic approaches as new information has become available and have involved experts to guide their decisions and acted accordingly.

Let's hope their leadership continues to guide us through this terrible time so that we can all return back to a more normal way of life in the near future.

John St. Clair, Pleasant Grove

https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/letters/2020/04/14/letter-democrats-are/