On a Monday night in early December, Baret Lepejian called his son Lucas: He wanted to know what he thought about California governor Gavin Newsom’s newest order re-shuttering the state’s beleaguered bars and restaurants as coronavirus cases climbed across the country.

Lucas Lepejian, who has been managing the family’s saloon, Tinhorn Flats, while his dad is overseas for business, didn’t agree with it, but there wasn’t much he could do but wait it out.

“I go, ‘It’s Monday night for you, right?’ He’s like, ‘Yep.’ I’m like, ‘Thursday morning, you’re reopening,’” Baret Lepejian recalled in an interview with National Review. “He started …