Hart Helps Inaugurate New Democrat Forum

Presidential contender Gary Hart and the California Democratic Party, both in financial debt and hungry for attention, came together in Los Angeles Friday to inaugurate a new speaking forum designed to pep up Southern California Democratic politics.

For too long, as organizers of the “California Forum” see it, big-name Democratic politicians have been quietly plundering California’s campaign contributors, but offering little in return and attracting scant public attention here.

Thus, creation of the forum. National Democratic leaders, visiting here for their own fund raising, are being offered an extra stipend up to $2,500 for an “original” speech to party officials and civic leaders. The state Democratic Party will use the events to raise money for itself and to provide local exposure to the top talent of the party.

Fittingly, the first speaker was Hart, the Colorado senator who ran for President on a platform of new ideas. He is a frequent face among Southern California checkbook Democrats.

Hart’s subject was military reform, and he offered a rebuke to those politicians who engage in the debate strictly in terms of whether there should be more or less defense spending.

“The real issue in the defense debate should be neither more nor less, but better,” Hart told the crowd of about 350.

He labeled as misguided the Reagan Administration’s plans for a 600-ship Navy built around an expanded fleet of aircraft carriers.

“In exercise after exercise, submarines sink aircraft carriers. A naval war game just a few months ago proved the point. In that exercise, a Canadian submarine easily sneaked within torpedo range of the U.S. aircraft carrier America,” Hart told the crowd.

The senator, one of the founders of the Military Reform Caucus in Congress, is an advocate of a Navy emphasizing submarines. He also has said the Pentagon should receive no spending increases for the next five years except for inflation adjustments.

Hart has reported a 1984 presidential campaign debt of $3.5 million, but an aide said it will take only $1.5 million to satisfy debtors. Scheduled weekend fund raisers on his behalf in Los Angeles and Orange County this weekend are expected to net Hart about $75,000.

The Democratic Party, still $200,000 in the red from 1984, will raise several hundred thousand dollars this year by selling tickets to the California Forum, Southern California Party Chairman Peter D. Kelly said.