Rules For Us and Rules For Them
As Gov. Gavin Newsom shuts down the state again, reports show that he attended a fancy, multi-couple dinner in Napa — while lawmakers party in Hawaii. Will a court ruling rein in our kings?
by Steven Greenhut
November 19, 2020, 12:00 AM
Of all the quotable lines in George Orwell’s Animal Farm, few resonate as much as this one: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.†That was, of course, the proclamation of the pigs who controlled the government, lest any of the lesser species harbor grandiose notions about their place in the barnyard’s pecking order.
That quotation has been referred to often in recent days after Gov. Gavin Newsom — fresh off of issuing a new set of edicts admonishing Californians to dine alone at home and curtail their Thanksgiving celebrations — was caught dining with his wife and 10 other friends at a birthday party for a prominent lobbyist at the French Laundry in Yountville.
No one is surprised that governors live comfortable lives, but it’s a bit rich when they are immune from the rules that they wantonly impose on the rest of us.
It’s bad enough for the governor to seemingly violate his own edicts, but to do so in Napa Valley, at one of the nation’s toniest restaurants, certainly gave off the wrong vibe. The governor claims that his attendance at the event wasn’t actually a violation of state coronavirus restrictions because they dined outdoors, but he did eventually issue an apology.
“I made a bad mistake. Instead of sitting down, I should have stood up and walked back, got in my car and drove back to my house,†Newsom said in a video statement. “The spirit of what I’m preaching all the time was contradicted, and I got to own that. And so I want to apologize to you…. We’re all human, we all fall short sometimes.â€
That’s fair enough, but this wasn’t the only example of a governor who lives by a different set of rules. Sacramento’s public schools have yet to reopen as they await the final phase-in rules, but Newsom’s four children are back in classrooms at the high-end private school where he sends them. No one is surprised that governors live comfortable lives, but it’s a bit rich when they are immune from the rules that they wantonly impose on the rest of us.
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https://spectator.org/gavin-newsom-coronavirus-rules/
