By Assemblyman Kevin Kiley – March 21, 2022
Mandates are ending everywhere, but the Legislature’s “Vaccine Work Group” wants to relive the glory days. You can see the status of their irresponsible bills here. I believe we can defeat each and every one of them.
Newsom, meanwhile, is patting himself on the back. His Public Health Department says it “couldn’t be prouder” of our COVID response. Personally, I couldn’t be prouder of all the communities that fought back.
Take Placer, my home county. For two years, the Sacramento Bee has called us “reckless,” “COVID deniers,” and “anti-science extremists.” Now (to its credit) the paper has issued a mea culpa.
In a story headlined “Placer County was ground zero for COVID culture wars. How did its approach work out?” the Bee admits we got it right, concluding “Placer County’s per capita COVID-19 death rate is about two-thirds that of the state average.”
Our businesses stayed open, our kids kept learning, and our citizens were left to make their own decisions. The result was outcomes far better than Newsom inflicted on the state as a whole.
To counter Newson’s inane new slogan, The California Way, I’d offer The Placer Way. Or the way of El Dorado, or many other places that charted their own course. Ultimately, this is The American Way: entrusting power to local communities and their citizens.
That’s why it hardly even matters that the Senate pathetically voted to keep the State of Emergency last week. The people of California have simply moved on.
