California Gov. Gavin Newsom continues to show no common sense in managing the coronvirus AKA SARS CoV-2 or Covid-19 crisis, insisting he must listen to infectious disease experts. Newsom stepped out of bounds, ordering the shutdown of South Orange County beaches, after seeing TV footage of Newport and Huntington beaches replete with beachgoers over last weekend. “We’re guided by health,” calling the beach closures a “temporary pause,” making zero sense. Newsom made wild predictions March 19 before declaring a statewide “shelter in place” order, claiming that 25.5 million or 60% of California’s 39.51 million population would be infected by May 19. California recorded its 56,055 case with 2,136 deaths today, showing that Newsom’s forecasts are grossly inaccurate. When he issued in statewide beach closure order, there’s no reliable scientific data to show that it puts California at greater risk.
Yet Newsom nsists “we’re guided by health,” something that’s his favorite catch-phrase to justify reckless decisions that have put the state into dire economic straits. Newsom didn’t have to shut down Calfiornia’s economy to accomplish his goal of slowing the spread to the virus. He could have issued “stay at home” order for vulnerable populations, not include the vast majority of residents that aren’t impacted by Covid-19. Newsom knows the new epidimoological data indicates that at least 50% of residents infected with coronavirus have no symptoms at all, so-called asymptomatic varieties. While it’s true that a small fraction of the State’s population develops severe symptoms, the vast majority have mild flu-like symptoms or no symptoms at all. Knowing that, how could Newsom justify shutting down the State’s economy, causing some 20%-30% unemployment?
Consequences to the California treasury are devastating, with the State burning through it’s $21 billion Rainy-Day fund, designed by former Gov. Jerry Brown to backstop the state in an emergency. It’s now obvious that Newsom’s rigid, one size-fits-all approach, has cost the state millions of jobs, and the state treasury billions in tax revenue. No, for Newsom, it’s all about “health,” but only because he doesn’t look at the consequences of his actions, on what his number-crunchers tell him. Those same number-crunchers told Newsom that 60% of the state would be infected. But it’s turning out, though not verified by testing yet, that much larger number of State residents have been infected with coronvirus but they have zero symptoms, changing nothing in their daily routines. Yet if you listen to Newsom, everyone infected with coronvirus winds up in the ICU on a ventilator.
Watching TV footage of Orange County beachgoers was enough to send Newsom over the top. “The photographs I say, quite honestly, were a stark contrast to what the governor’s acting on,” said Orange County Sheriff Don Barnes. Barnes said he won’t order his deputies to harass, cite or arrest Orange County beachgoers per the governor’s order. “My intent . . . is to seek voluntary compliance, Barnes said. “I have no desire to enforce . . . through arrest,” defying Newsom’s order. Newsom has no evidence that most Orange County beachgoers were not practicing social distancing or wearing masks. “We can’t see images like we saw, particularly Saturday, in Newport Beach and elsewhere,” Newsom said. “This virus doesn’t take the weekend off. This virus doesn’t go home because it’s a beautiful sunny day around our coasts,” Newsom said sarcastically, antagonizing more California residents.
Newsom doesn’t get that a public health crisis doesn’t mean that you lock people up because it’s the call of epipdemiologists. There’s more that goes in to running a state. Newsom must assess the economic damage to the state, driving more ordinary citizens into unemployment and potential homelessness. If Newsom has no state funds for health care, education, homeless and infrastructure, what’s he supposed to do? Continue listening to health experts that are only concerned about slowing the virus. But the other side of that argument is that growing number of infected California residents have no symptoms at all, developing immunity to the disease. Newsom doesn’t see that there’s more to governing than following advice from infectious disease experts and number-crunching forecasters. All of Newsom’s forecasts have been wrong and so are his decisions about closing State beaches.
Gov. Gavin Newsom has showed limited capacity to think independently of medical advice, get the big picture and show appropriate common sense to manage the Covid-19 crisis. This isn’t about Newsom “seeing images,” it’s about showing leadership at a time when the State is going down the tubes. With Los Angeles unemployment hitting Depression-era 30%, it’s time for the governor to stop talking about health and show some common sense. Letting the State go bankrupt or begging Washington for a bailout is no way to manage the nation’s most populous state. Instead of showing indecisiveness costing State residents jobs and the treasury tax revenue, Newsom needs to implement a plan soon to reopen workplaces. He can warn vulnerable residents to keep sheltering in place or go to work, recreation or play at their own risk, something he should have already done.
