Commentary

Governor Inslee has seemed to push off responsibility for the welfare of the state to other state governmental entities so he can focus on what he’s really after, his environmental and tax agendas.

Never in my over six decades have I seen a governor ignore his constituents’ commerce and financial needs by allowing the Washington State Department of Health to determine how every citizen will function in their daily life.

Yes, we have a flu virus, which is not something out of the ordinary. Throughout our thousands of years of existence, humans have had to deal with some type of illness while continuing to work and provide for themselves and families.

History shows we just don’t stop living because a nasty bug has popped up, and we certainly don’t hand over whether or not we do business to the health department, or at least to the best of my recollection.

Yes, it is important to do what we can to minimize health issues, but the cure MUSN’T be worse than the disease. People are dying, getting sick and losing hope because of this insane shutdown.

It is time the people of this state get a backbone and tell our tax-paid employees how the bosses (citizens) want this handled.

It is not up to a handful of people, not including the governor because he relinquished his responsibility to other governmental entities, to destroy over seven million lives. Inslee has turned a deaf ear and shrugged his shoulders at the cries and pleas of the people of this state for relief. At first, we were willing to oblige his mandates, but they are becoming unreasonable and lack substantive scientific evidence.

We wear masks as asked, maintain physical distance from others, and minimize our contact with friends, family and loved ones; we shop on line and change our daily routines from going to an office to working from home, but according to reports from the governor and the health department, infection cases continue to rise. It is obvious that what we are doing is NOT working.

I have observed case numbers of other states that have not imposed stringent commerce and living restrictions, and they are finding COVID-19 cases at a minimum. The data suggests that states with fewer restrictions have a low to moderate death rate–if the numbers are to be believed–and unemployment numbers are also lower in those states.

The national media is hyperventilating about the increasing numbers of infections across the United States, and the body count, without providing perspective in the percentage of total population that COVID is impacting. There is a difference between dying with COVID and dying of COVID, because that is the factor that should be made clear. We say people are dying of pneumonia, or cancer, or heart disease, but with COVID, nowadays, everybody is dying of COVID, but it seems that is the only cause of death being reported.

I believe we have an issue with the new flu virus, named COVID-19, and it is up to us to manage ourselves in such a way that we prevent getting it, and spreading it, but that is up to us to follow basic hygiene as we have done for influenza, pneumonia, or any other virus or malady that the populace contracts during those “seasons.”

The governor seems to be blind to the real crisis here, and, yes, coronavirus is the cause because of the way Inslee has addressed it. The shutdowns are causing the crisis.

It certainly tells me that getting out in the open, working and living as usual is more beneficial for us all than shutting down.