Don’t forget local candidates

I’m following my congressional race back home. Are you?

Let me ask you a question:

How many federal elections are going on right now in addition to the presidential election?

Answer: 470. All 435 House seats are open, as are 35 Senate seats.

Did you know that?

Do you care?

You should. The results of some of those elections will determine a lot more in our lives than Obama or McCain will.

Like many of you, I’m a news junkie, always following the election news. Also like most of you, I’m getting a little nauseated by the presidential election and all its Saks Fifth Avenue, Joe Six-Pack and Joe the Plumber tomfoolery, and I wanted to check out other current elections.

So I Googled my hometown (San Bernardino, in California’s 41st District) to check up on the congressional race. I didn’t expect much, so my jaw dropped when I found out about the challenger’s campaign. My high school tennis coach is working as a campaign manager for a local lawyer from my Rotary Club, who’s running against the Republican congressional incumbent, Jerry Lewis.

Rep. Lewis has been in the House since 1979, and he became a pretty big wheel serving as chair or ranking member of three committees and subcommittees. His brother worked for the local Seventh-Day Adventist hospital, and he went to high school three miles from my house. He was, in the most prosaic way, a fact of my life. Jerry Lewis was my congressman ““ that’s just how it was. So I didn’t think about him much, choosing rather to worry about presidential elections when I was young.

After taking a second look, I found that what I had always thought was a staunchly Republican district was actually in the middle of a tight race. San Bernardino County Democrats have been planning to take city council seats, congressional races, state legislature positions ““ all right under my nose. I was embarrassed; all my life, I focused on big elections while forgetting Tip O’Neill’s awkward but apt axiom: “All politics is local.”

While most of us took high school U.S. history and government, we may have also forgotten how our local government affects our lives, which is understandable. We’re busy.

But really, what does Congress do?

It responds. Representatives get feedback from their home districts and do their best to respond to requests, from a high school senior looking for a recommendation to West Point or Annapolis, to a complaint about the IRS, to a question about the bailout. And, despite all the bickering and denunciation of Congress recently, they do respond. Just look at the rejection of the first bailout.

Sen. Barbara Boxer’s (D-Calif.) office received 2,000 phone calls to her California office, 900 calls to her Washington office, and 17,000 e-mails opposing the first bailout bill, and she voted accordingly. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Ill.) were also swamped with calls and e-mails, so a dedication to constituents isn’t monopolized by party.

Finally, Congress guarantees that whoever the next president is, he won’t do everything you’re afraid (or hopeful) that he will. While we toss around the term “checks and balances” like it’s an empty water bottle, we forget that Congress has strangled or pushed through presidential pet projects. Newt Gingrich, reacting to a perceived snub by President Clinton after a state funeral, led a Republican-dominated Congress to incite a budget crisis in 1996.

A president with a Congress dominated by the same party has no guarantee of cooperation. In 1868, despite his position on the Republican ticket, President Andrew Johnson’s conciliatory approach to the South during Reconstruction got him impeached and almost thrown out of office ““ by other Republicans.

In addition to these 470 elections, there are also 11 governorships up for grabs, as well as countless state legislature seats, city council positions, mayorships, referendums, laws, initiatives, propositions and other things to vote for. We’ve been hearing a lot about Propositions 1A, 2, 4 and 8 here in Los Angeles, but how many of us are thinking about city council positions back home?

So, for those of you hanging your hopes on Obama or McCain winning next week, step back for a moment. As trite as it sounds, make sure your voice is heard.

Vote in your congressional election. Shape your community and invest in your government.

Anyone can worry about the nation; make sure you’re taken care of at home.

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