Henry Waxman, the mustache of justice, always seemed to me to be the
sort of legislator who was motivated by that typical and highly-useful
Jewish trait, dissatisfaction -- dissatisfaction with the way things are,
which is, at bottom, the motivation of so many Jews to who try to
change the world (for better and occasionally for worse, of course).
Waxman recently published a book,
The Waxman Report: How Congress Really Works,
with my next-door neighbor, the telegenic
Joshua Green. The book is
half-memoir, half-expose, about a Jewish congressman from a Los Angeles
community of immigrants who came to believe that government could fix
problems too big to be fixed otherwise. I dispatched Goldblog
Congressional Affairs Correspondent Tali Yahalom to interview Waxman
about his work and about how his faith informs his legislative agenda.
Tali Yahalom: You are
quoted as saying that many of your American values are "synonymous" with your
Jewish values. Can you talk about that?
Henry Waxman: Jewish values
place a great emphasis on compassion and trying to help other people, and the
doctrine of
tikkun olam, trying to repair the world -- this of course is a
requirement on individuals but also on the community. One way for people to act
in a communal sense and to respond to the needs of the less fortunate is
through government.
TY: Do you
believe that you are doing
tikkun olam through a career in government?
HW: I do believe
that I am very close to the ideals of the Jewish religion as well as American
values -- to try to use my position in public office to better the lives of
millions of Americans.
TY: How do you
apply your Jewish values to your current legislative initiatives, namely health care?
HW: I take
seriously what the objectives are in the legislation and try to keep a clear
and disciplined focus on trying to move in the direction of the necessary
accomplishments. I think it's easy for people to get sidetracked and to think
that compromise may not be worthy, even though it could produce a move in the
direction of helping people.
TY: In the
beginning of your book, you write, "nearly every worthwhile fight in my career
began with my being badly outmatched." Do you still feel like that today? And is it a constructive
mindset?
HW: I often feel
that special interest groups have more clout than they should in Washington. I
think that a lot of times, powerful interests try to bully their way into their
point of view, but if you stand up to them, and they don't have a really solid
argument to make, they're not going to ultimately prevail.
TY: That's a pretty Jewish mindset.
HW: It's hard to
sometimes know what's Jewish and American -- they're so close together.
This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2009/08/henry-waxman-on-how-faith-informs-his-politics/22943/
