<i> Snapshots of life in the Golden State.</i> : A Meaty Issue Simmers at Brown Campaign Rally

Former Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr. has been seeking to stitch together a broad base of support for his presidential bid. But the message sometimes veers closer to contradiction than coalition.

At least that was the case in the exhibition area of his recent California campaign kickoff rally in Santa Monica.

Plunked down among various world peace and ecology booths was one sponsored by the Vegetarian Society of Southern California. “Meat Kills” and “Meat Stinks” read the group’s posters.

Within aroma’s distance, three booths away, was a hot dog stand.

Vegetarian Society member Vic Forsythe said the odd juxtaposition reflected the diversity inherent in the Brown campaign.

“We’re trying to educate the public about eating sick animals shot full of drugs,” he said. “But it’s a question of choice.”

Rene Guevre, who operates Jimmy’s Hot Dogs, had no such broad-brush thoughts. “We’re just here for business,” he asserted.

CANDIDATE CONDIMENTS

Food fight: Meanwhile, the three-way Republican primary campaign for California’s six-year U.S. Senate seat is getting downright sticky.

It began with mini-waffles that Rep. Tom Campbell mailed political writers to hammer home the point that opponent Bruce Herschensohn is “waffling” on such issues as Social Security and a flat tax.

In response, the third contender, Palm Springs Mayor Sonny Bono, sent reporters table syrup. “You don’t eat waffles without syrup,” the Bono campaign explained. Likewise, Campbell has not been sharing his full record with the public, they said.

Unfortunately, the 1.5-ounce containers of syrup, artificial no less, broke open in the mail, making it nearly impossible to read Bono’s message.

The Herschensohn campaign, for its part, is washing its hands of the entire affair. Branding the food fight “immature,” spokesman Nick Thimmesch II pledged that the Los Angeles TV commentator will dispatch no vitriolic victuals of his own.

California Voters

This year’s Presidential election is the first in California since 1932 that registered Democrats have totaled less than 50% of all registered voters . Statewide, 63.1% of those eligible to vote are registered. Party affiliation in California in February is shown below:

NO.VOTERS %OFTOTAL PARTY REGISTERED REGISTERED Democrats 6,279,559 48.46 Republicans 5,070,714 39.13 Declines to State 1,197,156 9.24 American Independent 156,321 1.21 Greens 103,903 0.80 Peace and Freedom 55,907 0.43 Libertarian 53,228 0.41 Miscellaneous/Non-qualified* 42,518 0.33

TOTAL Registered Voters: 12,959,306

TOTAL Eligible Voters**: 20,531,451

* Ballots filled out with no recognizable party.

** U.S. citizens in the state, 18 and over, minus prisoners and parolees.

SOURCE: Report of Registration, Office of the Secretary of State, Sacramento, Feb. 1992.

Compiled by researcher Tracy Thomas

D.A.’s MIAs

Advisers in absentia: Once viewed as an eventual gubernatorial candidate, camera-ready Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Ira Reiner took a mighty tumble in 1990 when he lost the Democratic state attorney general primary in the aftermath of the McMartin preschool child abuse case.

Now, Reiner, locked in a reelection battle against three thorny foes, has also lost the services of his longtime brain trust.

Wily adviser and friend Mickey Kantor is serving as national chairman for the Clinton for President campaign this spring. And Reiner’s other leading political confidant, Los Angeles attorney William Wardlaw, is Clinton’s state chairman.

“We still support Ira (and) we still give money to Ira,” says Wardlaw. “But Mickey and I thought beating George Bush was a higher priority.”

AD TIME

Airwave angles: It’s time again for those TV campaign ads, and early indications are that, as usual, the 30-second packaging of California’s U.S. Senate candidates will not be a pretty sight.

An informal survey of some of the state’s leading political writers rates Rep. Mel Levine’s TV spots the weakest in circulation. Almost any voice might seem high-pitched compared to that of the ad’s narrator, James Earl Jones, they say. But when Levine is heard, his voice sounds like a young teen-ager’s squeak.

Sen. John Seymour ranks as the craftiest candidate for his efforts to turn around a bad situation--namely, the fact that half of the state’s voters have no idea who he is.

In his ads, Seymour rails against the arrogance of Congress, while failing to mention that he is a senator. From the tone, a betting man might wager that Seymour has never visited Washington.

One genre that will not reappear this spring is “Booing the Democratic Candidate at the Democratic Convention,” popularized in 1990 by then-gubernatorial contender Dianne Feinstein.

In that campaign, the Feinstein camp, seeking political points in a pro-death penalty state, ran a clip of her being jeered by conventioneers while speaking in favor of executions. At this month’s convention, Feinstein said nothing that was booed. “It’s already been done,” joked Kam Kuwata, her campaign manager.

But watch for Barbara Boxer ads featuring “dramatic” convention footage. The Bay Area congresswoman turned the recent gathering into a veritable sound stage--with 40 sign-waving supporters storming the podium, in front of her campaign video crew, as she was introduced to speak. Acting shocked and amazed by the “spontaneous” demonstration that lasted all of two minutes, Boxer mugged for the camera and then loudly declared: “I’m almost out of breath from the excitement!”

EXIT LINES

“No question about it. We’ve got to have California to win in November.”

--Ron Brown, national chairman of the Democratic Party, whose presidential candidates have carried the state only once since 1948.

“It’s never easy in California. This state makes people sweat.”

--Republican Gov. Pete Wilson, commenting on the GOP’s presidential chances in California this year.