McClintock: Let Us Not Criticize Governor Newsom

Congressman Tom McClintock recently spoke on the House Floor.

McClintock was Friday’s KVML “Newsmaker of the Day”.

“Mr. Speaker:

I rise this morning in defense of Governor Gavin Newsom who recently defied his own idiotic Covid edicts as he partied at one of the few restaurants that he has not yet forced out of business. I defend him because he was doing what we all once did in a free society: make our own decisions over what risks we are willing to run and what precautions we are willing to take according to our own circumstances to protect our own health.

Yes, Covid is a nasty bug and a quarter of a million Americans have died while having it. But this isn’t the Bubonic Plague. The CDC’s best estimate is that if you are under 49, your chance for surviving Covid – it you get it – is 99.92 percent. Even for those over 70 the survival rate is 94.6 percent.

Forty percent who get it don’t even know they have it. Yet we have allowed our officials to ruin our quality of life over it – destroying countless businesses, throwing tens of millions into unemployment, robbing our children of their educations and shredding our most cherished rights as Americans.

Governor Newsom’s night of partying should be a wake-up call to every American.

Every time we step outside our homes, the risks we face multiply. A free society assumes that its citizens are competent to assess those risks, balance them against the avoidance costs, and to manage their decisions in a generally responsible way. It’s called common sense, and it’s a necessary prerequisite for self-government and liberty.

The choices of an octogenarian with emphysema might be very different from those of a healthy governor in California. Only a fool would claim the omniscience to make an informed judgment for every person in every circumstance in every community. Sadly, this crisis has revealed that fools abound in public office and that a fool with power can quickly become a petty tyrant.

Which brings us back to Governor Newsom. These government nannies love to tell us that they’re just following the science. What does the science tell us? It tells us that Covid poses virtually no risk to children but can be severe among the elderly. So, what did these lockdown leftists do? They closed all the schools and ordered infected patients into nursing homes!

The science tells us that outdoor transmissions of the virus are extremely rare and that 80 percent of infections occur in people’s homes. So what did these lockdown leftists do? They closed our beaches, parks and campgrounds and ordered people to stay at home!

The science tells us that obesity is a contributing factor to the severity of the disease. So what did these lockdown leftists do? They closed all the gyms and kept the liquor stores open!

These lockdowns haven’t saved lives. The states with the most stringent lockdowns generally have the highest mortality rates from Covid. Utah stayed open while next door, Colorado shut down. Utah currently has half the Covid mortality rate and 3/4 the unemployment rate as Colorado. But the lockdowns have cost countless lives from suicides, drug and alcohol abuse, domestic violence, and deferred health screenings and treatments.

Recently, Governor Newsom demanded that restaurant diners replace their masks after every bite, but also minimize the times they take them off. I guess that means take very big bites. Thanksgiving dinners are allowed in California, but only when they are held outside, guests are seated six feet apart, and they last no more than two hours. It’s all right to use the bathroom, but only if it is frequently sanitized. Otherwise, presumably you’ll just have to use the bushes. And for God’s sake – NO SINGING!

I have wondered how much longer the American people are going to tolerate this nonsense?

So let us not criticize Governor Newsom. Perhaps he has just offered us all deliverance from his own folly.

Nor should we criticize the California legislators who ignored travel and quarantine restrictions to junket to Hawaii. Nor should we ridicule Speaker Pelosi for choosing not to wear a mask in a hair salon that was forced to close for the rest of us.

Good for them. They’re demonstrating by their own actions the freedom that every American citizen needs to reclaim from these very same people. The governor SHOULD make his own decisions about running his own life. I only ask that he and his ilk would stop telling the rest of us how to run ours.”

The “Newsmaker of the Day” is heard every weekday morning at 6:45, 7:45 and 8:45 on AM 1450 and FM 102.7 KVML.