Re “Waxman, Whacked by Veterans, Claims He Is a Hyper-Activist for Them”
The gulf between an incumbent and a challenger is at least the distance between San Francisco and Boston, and that was proven once again two nights ago at the Venice Neighborhood Council meeting.
The spacious auditorium at Westminster Elementary School was bulging with so many politically committed Venetians that larger and older denizens were fanning themselves with political flyers.
For some, the main event was a set of 10-minute talks by one of America’s best known members of Congress, the Westside Democrat Henry Waxman, and newby Bill Bloomfield, a creative adjective for a retired gentleman with gray hair and the seasoning of 62 birthday parties.
If Mr. Waxman didn’t have to stave off fans, at least every one of the several hundreds recognized his favorite moustache or his favorite expression or his bald pate. For 38 years, his mug has been turning up in America’s newspapers.
Mr. Bloomfield not only was not asked to repel an onrush of curious voters, the mistress of ceremonies deposited his name into a hamburger grinder on the way to figuring out how his name worked.
Three syllables.
Easier to master than his opponent’s.
Didn’t matter.
Linda Lucks, President of the Venice Neighborhood Council, called him Bill, then Mike because someone in the audience hollered “Mike,” and then she returned, shakily, to “Bill Bloomfield,” after which she mercifully took a step back.
Obviously, the affable and seemingly unflappable Mr. Bloomfield, a lifetime resident of the district, was not at a meeting of the Bosom Buddy Club.
Just Between Us
He launched into the kind of muscular speech that you would expect from a Berkeley graduate who grew into a moderate/liberal Republican, which he used to be, or an Independent, which he has been since wheeling around the corner to 60.
An entrepreneur for 33 years, a Rotarian for 31 years who serves on five non-profit boards, engaging and engaged to a charming lady, his profile marks him as a WASPish man of considerable ambition, commitment and success.
Mr. Bloomfield tells every audience the reason he is running is because he seeks to cure the hyper-partisanship in Congress, which is exactly why Mr. Waxman, who hardly ever has campaigned since 1975, stresses with the greatest of ease and stage-whisper tact that he is the king, or darned near the epitome, of bipartisanship.
“Here’s the deal,” Mr. Bloomfield said of gridlock. “Venice, Cambridge, Cheyenne, Wyoming, we are all suffering from a Congress that has quit working.
“Whether it’s to get our fiscal house in order or fund education, we have to get Congress working. As you know, Congress is more polarized than it used to be. Republicans are sending people there who are more conservative than they had been. Democrats are sending people who are more liberal.
“I believe I am uniquely qualified to go back there to unblock Congress.
“This issue at hand is getting Congress working, figuring it out, because nothing is working.”
Mr. Bloomfield, offering a 12-point plan, stressed how busy he has been on the sidelines in recent years, working on a battery of reforms, including redistricting, and helping to lead non-partisan political organizations.
What to Make of It
How did this play with the left-wing Venice audience?
Maybe not badly because Mr. Bloomfield bolstered his declared bona fides by tethering himself to positions commonly associated with many Democrats, same-sex marriage and abortion among others.
To counter Mr. Bloomfield’s promises, Mr. Waxman later identified a lengthy calendar of legislative accomplishments.
And so the question with an unknowable answer is, which case impressed the crowd more?
