3 Things Newsom is Telling Us

by Alyssa Erdley

News with Attitude

California Governor Gavin Newsom was outed as having flouted his own state's guidelines and rules when he was caught attending a birthday party on November 6 at the exclusive French Laundry restaurant in Napa.

At the time of the gathering, which consisted of at least 10 people seated together at a table, Napa was in the Orange Tier of Covid restrictions, which is somewhat looser than others.

However, the entire state had been prohibited from attending gatherings involving more than three different households - a rule handed down in mid-October. On October 3, Governor Newsom's office tweeted that diners should don masks in-between bites of food if they go out to eat at a restaurant. Nobody at the photographed birthday party for Newsom's friend Jason Kinney were wearing masks at all, let alone in between bites.

In a telling twist, attendees of the party included two officials from the California Medical Association, CEO Dustin Corcoran and lobbyist Janus Norman. The CMA has lobbied the state government for COVID-19 guidelines, and the organization has funded an ad campaign urging people to wear masks.

Since the birthday dinner party, Napa County has experienced a surge in COVID-19 cases and moved to the more restrictive purple tier.

Newsom issued a limp apology on November 16, after news of the party went public. He declined to admit he'd violated state guidelines, but he did admit he'd contradicted "the spirit of what I'm preaching" and promised never to make such a mistake again.

Given the soul-squelching restrictions which Governor Newsom, as chief executive of the state, has single-handedly imposed on the populace, his apology is not the message we are hearing.

What we are hearing from him is this:

1. The COVID-19 disease is not so dangerous, after all.

Otherwise, why would the governor, privy to regular briefings from health experts, agree to attend a gathering of non-family members without a mask? If anyone should know the risks of such a situation, it would be Newsom. Yet, he sat down with several non-household members, influential people who regularly interact with a variety of other non-household members and so are in a high-risk category for receipt of germs. Yet Gavin Newsom felt perfectly comfortable in sitting next to these germ transmitters - and was, in fact, an excellent germ transmitter himself. He felt comfortable enough to go without a mask.

2. People in power are too special to transmit or contract COVID-19

Everyone at the birthday gathering at the French Laundry, where meals range between $300 and $400, was a player, an influencer, a power broker. Such people are too special, too elite to catch such a loser disease as COVID-19. Their very flesh is protected by virtue of their specialness. And, just in case, they have ready access to excellent, rapid COVID testing so they can make sure no one in their circle can transmit the unwanted virus to them.

3. People ruled by those in power are dirty vermin

Since those in power cannot transmit or contract COVID-19, the disease is entirely the realm of the underclass. They alone are responsible for the spread of the novel coronavirus through the population. Their ignorant, foolish behavior is responsible for all the infections and deaths in the state. The underclass must therefore be ruled and restricted, to prevent them from killing each other through their stupid actions in trying to be human, love their families, and make a living.

Newsom's actions speak louder than words, including any apology, even one that might come off as more complete and believable than the one he already issued. If he truly believed COVID-19 warranted the fearful behavior he is imposing on the rest of us, preventing our every natural human instinct to be with our fellow humans, then he would not have sat down at that table, free of a mask or any inhibitions.