'The Waxman Report: How Congress Really Works' by Henry Waxman with Joshua Green

Pretty faces and promising careers tend to flash across our local political firmament with the frequency of shooting stars -- and with about as much effect. But for more than two decades, the most consequential elected official in Southern California has been a short, bald, decidedly mustached congressman from Los Angeles' Westside named Henry Waxman.

By Tim Rutten

July 1, 2009