Second of two parts
Re “No Upset That City Hall’s Sphere of Influence Is Slender”
[img]1305|right|Andy Weissman||no_popup[/img]Lives there not one breathing person who doubts that state Sen. Holly D. Mitchell (D-Culver City), state Assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas (D-Culver City) and U.S. Rep. Karen Bass (D-Culver City) will be lopsidedly re-elected at the end of their terms.
It is one of those amorphous, mystifying laws of life that must be obeyed — for reasons long forgotten.
And so the question was put to City Councilman Andy Weissman –
How should an average voter measure the re-election worthiness of each of his three delegates to Sacramento and Washington?
What is the most reliable yardstick?
After a lifetime in politics, Mr. Weissman sounded as baffled as anyone else.
“I don’t know that there is an objective measure,” he said. “I don’t think voters look at legislative results. They believe their elected representative is looking out for their interests.
“I don’t even know if it is possible to measure the job a representative is doing,” Mr. Weissman said. “Take what a candidate says during a campaign.
“What did Christopher King say recently when he was running in the City Council election? The first thing he would do when elected to the City Council would be to ban fracking, he said.
“You know that, No. 1, you cannot do that singlehandedly. So I am not sure how you would objectively measure success or failure.”
Then how do you know which of the three deserve to be re-elected?
“I don’t know what people look to when they are making those decisions,” Mr. Weissman said. “Often it is based on personalities and referrals – ‘what my neighbor is doing. I don’t have information one way or the other. But my neighbor, whom I like, has a sign on his lawn. If it is good enough for him, it is good enough for me.’
“In other cases, there might be a piece of legislation that the elected official is able to get through. If you can demonstrate you are more successful than not in Sacramento or Washington, then you can make the case for being an effective legislator,” Mr. Weissman said.
“If you introduce a hundred bills, and 104 don’t pass, you still may be re-elected on the basis that at least you are trying.”
