When the Maine Heritage Policy Center gave vocal support to James O’Keefe’s videos of fraudulent welfare applications, it essentially raised the Jolly Roger.

These were staged episodes of harassment, designed not to catch a scandal but to create one. In neither case was there concern for the embarrassment or harm done to the two civil servants. They were expendable, just pawns in a larger game. It is a moral wrong to deceive and use an innocent person in this way, regardless of the intended good to society or political cause.

Religious leaders and others concerned with civility and ethics, especially conservatives, have now an obligation to disassociate themselves with the Maine Heritage Policy Center. If they cannot, they are obliged to use their influence to return it to safer moral waters.

It is not a time for silence.

Joe Makley, West Paris