It’s time for Newsom to give up his emergency powers
Recently, chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden, Dr. Anthony Fauci, declared that the COVID-19 pandemic is officially over.
While speaking with PBS Newshour, Fauci said, “We are certainly right now in this country out of the pandemic phase. Namely, we don’t have 900,000 new infections a day and tens and tens and tens of thousands of hospitalizations and thousands of deaths. We are at a low level right now
... So if you’re saying, ‘Are we out of the pandemic phase in this country?’ — we are.”
Fauci says the pandemic is over, and he’s right: In fact, we’re so over it, I think somebody just opened up a wet market on the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica.
But at some point the lightbulb went off with him, and Fauci realized that if the pandemic is over, so too are his TV bookings, laudatory newspaper profiles and swanky party invitations.
And this man likes the limelight.
Fauci used to be on TV constantly. Now it’s trickled to occasional appearances. He’s like the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’ Jason Alexander.
And if we know anything about Fauci, it’s that he is desperate to stay relevant.
Like clockwork, Fauci started walking back his claim.
While speaking to NPR, Fauci said, “I want to clarify one thing ... I probably should have said the acute component of the pandemic phase, and I understand how that can lead to some misinterpretation.”
With this guy, you can’t have the flip without the flop.
One person who has to be happy about this flip-flop is California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Here in the Golden State, we are still living in a state of emergency due to the pandemic, and there’s no indication that he intends to relinquish his power any time soon.
“[The pandemic is] not over, but certainly we have tools and a level of understanding that should no longer cause us to be afraid of what’s coming,” California Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly said. “But really to be prepared for it.”
Of course, nobody knows what the future will bring. If we did, we’d all be Tyler Henry and have a deal with Netflix.
But if the governor is able to grant himself unlimited powers because something bad might happen in the future, he’ll never give up those powers.
I’m standing by for evacuation orders from Dr. Ghaly, because there might be an earthquake next year.
Newsom’s emergency powers also trickle down to the local level — namely to the county departments of public health, which are granted their own powers to do things like impose mask mandates on their populations ... without ever having to take a vote.
Four days after a federal judge in Florida ruled that the Centers for Disease Control does not have the authority to issue a mask mandate for air travel, or on public transportation, Los Angeles County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer — who does not have a medical degree — announced that masks will again be required on all public transit within Los Angeles County.
Ferrer is demanding that the masks be worn on buses, subways, trains and any other mode of transportation that she wouldn’t be caught dead on.
In fact, I believe the only form of public transportation in L.A. that are exempt from mask requirements are aboard those drunken bachelorette party pedal tours.
If Newsom’s emergency powers were taken away, Ferrer would not have had the authority to impose such ridiculous mandates.
The emergency is over — and Fauci, Newsom and Ferrer all know it, whether they’re willing to admit to it or not.
It’s time for Newsom to lose his emergency powers — and more importantly — for us to go back to being a republic, and not a dictatorship.