Cisneros Housing Venture Leaves Poor Out in the Cold

Loretta Sanchez, Ms. August, is a bright and popular Southern Californian now serving her second term in Congress.

Born: Jan. 7, 1960. (Capricorn.)

Resides: Garden Grove.

Education: Chapman U., B.A.; American U., M.B.A.

Committees: Armed Forces; Education and the Workforce.

Likes: Sitting in the House of Representatives; passing a bill; walking on Orange County beaches in the rain.

Dislikes: Being told where she can hold a fund-raiser; Al Gore “cloaking himself in issues of morality.”

Pet Peeves: People who don’t vote!

If I Could Speak at a Democratic Convention for One Day, I Would Say: “Can’t we all get along?”

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Dear Rep. Sanchez:

I have just been reading a copy of a letter sent to you by Joe Andrew, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, dated Aug. 10.

He was kind enough to address it to “The Honorable Loretta Sanchez,” even though he was pretty much excoriating you for doing something dishonorable.

Joe Andrew sounded pretty exasperated about your wanting to hold a fund-raising party at the Playboy Mansion, right smack in the middle of the fun-for-the-whole-family Democratic National Convention.

I guess Joe must have felt that you and Hugh Hefner were planning to boogie all night together, swim in the grotto, play backgammon and roller blade in your pajamas.

For the life of me, I can’t understand why Democrats would be so anti-Playboy, seeing as how they’ve supported one in the White House for nearly eight years now.

Too bad that you couldn’t get it across to these Democratic Party poopers that the Playboy Mansion is nothing but a large private residence. That it isn’t some kind of Best Little Whorehouse in California.

True, it might be a place with a llama and a peacock living on the premises. But couldn’t you also say pretty much the same thing about a house inhabited by, say, James Carville and Mary Matalin?

Joe Andrew’s threat-o-gram to you went, in part: “I am hereby informing you that if you go forward with it, I will take actions in my capacity as Party Chair and President of the Democratic National Convention Committee.”

(One of these actions presumably being that rather than let you speak, Joe would have canceled your speaking appearance, or taken out his Bo Peep hook to yank you off the stage.)

His letter continued: “As a father of young children, I tried to convey to you my dismay at the kind of message that this event would send.”

Is Joe Andrew in the habit of explaining to young children why a member of Congress is tossing a $5,000-a-person political fund-raiser? And suppose young children did hear that Congresswoman Sanchez was about to raise a couple of million dollars to promote voter education? Would they want her to give the money back, just because she raised it at the House That Babes Built?

Rep. Sanchez, it’s a pity that you finally caved in Friday and agreed to move your shindig someplace else. It’s like something out of an Allen Drury novel, with vituperative party bigwigs demanding that you play ball or else.

How petty that the issues of Gore’s campaign would come to include back issues of Playboy. Wasn’t he aware that the Playboy Mansion has long been a gracious host to everything from women’s political caucuses to Rose Bowl football teams? That these events are held in a tent, not in a Jacuzzi? That attending a social event thrown by Hugh Hefner doesn’t make a guest pro-porno?

It really is too bad that these prigs could get the better of you this way with their political blackmail. As you said on Friday, in clarifying that this was about fund-raising, not about fun raising: “It’s never been about the Playboy Mansion. It is about putting on a good event and raising money.”

And we all know no presidential candidate would ever accept any funds from controversial sources, don’t we?

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My own invitation to the Playboy Mansion came a few days ago, to an “America 2000” party in recognition of the Dem convention. I couldn’t go, but maybe Hef will invite me back, for a Come as Your Favorite Republican costume party or something.

In the meantime, top Democrats continue to mobilize their Entertainment Police, led by Joe Lieberman (TV-movie censorship division), Tipper Gore (music) and Joe Andrew (adult magazines).

They decided to bully Sanchez, a dedicated Democrat doing positive things for her party and her people. Gore “doesn’t need to cloak himself with this whole issue of morality,” Sanchez put it the other day. “He is a good, honest, decent person.”

Imagine trying to deny a woman’s appearance in Staples Center by somehow linking it to other women’s appearances in stapled centerfolds. If this is indicative of Democrats in 2000, it is not a pretty picture.

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Mike Downey’s column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Write to: Los Angeles Times, 202 W. 1st St., Los Angeles, CA 90012. E-mail: mike.downey@latimes.com