A little lesson in big-time politics

S.J. CAHN

Newport Beach residents got a taste of national politics last month

that showed the great Catch-22 of having a leader in Congress also be

your representative.

Rep. Chris Cox, whose congressional district includes his hometown

of Newport Beach as well as Irvine and a vast swath of South County,

made headlines -- including in the Pilot -- when he met with local

Muslim leaders about the fate of an imam at the Islamic Institute of

Orange County in Anaheim -- a town that’s not part of Cox’s district

nor, apparently, one that inspires much baseball revenue. This imam,

55-year-old Wagdy Ghoneim, had been held by U.S. immigration

officials since early November because of an expired visa. Family

members had been asking that he be allowed to post bail and return

home to Qatar. They also complained that his detention was unfair

because of his health problems, and the FBI had said he posed no

threat to national security.

Finally, they ended up in Cox’s Newport Beach office, where

reports suggested a terrifically positive meeting.

“We commend Congressman Cox for taking such great leadership,”

said Ahmed Younis, national director of the Muslim Public Affairs

Council. “He really went over and above what they usually do in

situations like this.”

Ghoneim recently returned to Qatar.

The Muslim leaders came to Cox not only because he’s a nearby

congressman. Cox, who as the House Policy Committee chairman is the

fifth-ranking Republican in the House, has been head of the Homeland

Security Committee, which clearly would be involved in such issues

and concerns.

And there’s the key to the lesson, one that didn’t pass by at

least one notable Newport Beach resident.

After the report in the Pilot, the paper ran a letter from Airport

Working Group vice president Rick Taylor, who is also involved in the

Greenlight movement. He chided Cox for quickly responding to

non-constituents, while recognizing Cox’s role on the Homeland

Security Committee.

And then there was the kicker: “I couldn’t help but wonder what

Cox might have accomplished had he worked in the best interests of

his constituents in Newport Beach (remember us?) and flexed his

political muscle to land El Toro as an airport and alleviate the

transportation and air-traffic problems for the whole county.”

That question gained a brief bit of increased relevance when the

city of Los Angeles on Tuesday tried one last time to get control of

El Toro, so it could be turned into a commercial airport instead of

being sold off as the “Great Park.” Cox’s response played off the

other big news of the week, the name change of baseball’s Anaheim

Angels to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim: “There will be no ‘LAX

of Orange County,’ even if we have to suffer the indignity of the

‘Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.’”

Once again, Cox hadn’t stood up for his “constituents in Newport

Beach.”

The lesson of this Catch-22 is that having a national leader be

your representative may not be the boon you’d think. While it’s true

that Cox wields more power than a first-term representative from

North Carolina, he has far greater and expansive issues on his plate.

Back Bay dredging, government grants for water- quality improvements

and other benefits can get lost in the shuffle of national and

international affairs.

In other words, that first-term representative from North Carolina

might be able to get more done for the home district, because that’s

where all the focus is.

Of course, there’s one other lesson. In his letter, Taylor wrote:

“Cox didn’t want to offend the small minority of voters in South

County, who vehemently opposed El Toro, because he knew he might need

their support for his future endeavors.” By my rough count, there

were about 45,000 voters in Newport Beach in the November election

(that’s the total from the Marinapark Measure L race). By contrast,

there were about 127,000 voters in the rest of Cox’s district.

I suspect Cox realized the only way a Republican could lose this

particular House seat was to fire up that “small minority of voters”

who easily could carry an election by far greater numbers than the

countywide El Toro airport vote of 2002.

* S.J. CAHN is the managing editor. He may be reached at (714)

966-4607 or by e-mail at [email protected].