Right is Right and Rong is Rong

The question of ethics has reared its puckish head once more among our local politicians who, despite years of intensive education, still don’t seem to understand exactly what an ethic is. I’m here to tell them.

Among those always the most bewildered are members of L.A.’s City Council who can’t quite bridge the gap between Mammon and morality when it comes to the presence of money in their immediate vicinity. Not that they’re evil. Just addled. Therefore, to simplify what political ethics are all about, I offer this basic example: It’s all right to allow Mom to pay for your Grand Slam breakfast at Denny’s but not all right to accept an interest-free $5-million cash loan from a company lobbying for a contract to build a new City Hall.

Politicians, often confused by abstract thoughts and multisyllabic words, need a Dick-and-Jane approach to honesty in order to clear their heads.

Someone in Sacramento once suggested that legislators carry little cards in their pockets to remind them what was unethical, but the list became so long that the idea was abandoned.

An old-time liquor lobbyist who was always being investigated for something used to quote Mark Twain by saying, “An ethical man is a Christian holding four aces.” No one knew exactly what that meant but it didn’t matter, because he always paid for lunch and God only knows what else.

*

Two recent events bring to mind lapses of judgment among those who, one way or another, have their hands in our pockets. They involve council members Hal Bernson, a former Northridge T-shirt salesman, and Joel Wachs, who wants to be mayor.

Bernson paid $3,000 in fines to the L.A. Ethics Commission for accepting excessive free legal services from the local law firm of a City Hall lobbyist. Wachs is being investigated for spending more than $700,000 in public money for citywide mailers that may or may not have been aimed at enhancing his quest for Dick Riordan’s job.

Both expressed confusion, ignorance, innocence and amazement when their names were brought up in a manner that questioned their ethics. A kind of shocked “Who, me?” response.

This is the second time in recent years that Bernson has been nailed by the Ethics Commission, an organization founded in 1991 to, in effect, remind our public servants that right is right and wrong is wrong and they are spelled differently.

Just three years ago, old Hal paid $1,500 in fines for using public money to buy tickets to the Hollywood Bowl. He insisted they were used to discuss public business during performances of Wagner’s “Die Gotterdammerung,” but the commission wasn’t buying. “The Ring of the Nibelung,” perhaps, but not “Gotterdammerung.”

It was fellow Councilman Nate Holden who first accused Wachs of misusing city funds to further his name recognition in a run for mayor. It is no coincidence that Holden is backing City Atty. James Hahn for the same job.

Wachs claimed indignantly that the mailing was a public service and in turn criticized Holden for spending $45,223 in taxpayers’ money on a new Lincoln Navigator 2000. Holden, by the way, was fined $27,500 by the Ethics Commission just last year for violating campaign finance laws.

And the beat goes on.

*

As I rummaged through files of political misconduct furnished by the commission, I came to realize how many other council members had paid fines over the years. Richard Alatorre (now an ex-councilman), Mike Hernandez, Mark Ridley-Thomas, John Ferraro and Rudy Svorinich Jr. are all listed, along with large corporations, lawyers, lobbyists and others of questionable incomes.

I asked LeAnn Pelham if politicians today are more dishonest than they once were or just dumber. She’s acting executive director of the Ethics Commission. While declining to speculate on their intelligence levels, she did say she thought politicians were more honest.

This, I suppose, is in comparison to the days when unmarked envelopes filled with cash were passed under the table to legislators’ eager little hands.

One reason for increased honesty, Pelham suggests, is the presence of the commission itself. “Our job is not to be morals cops,” she says, “but our presence encourages people to be more honest. They’re afraid of getting caught.”

USC political scientist Sheldon Kamienieck agrees that without tough ethics laws, the pols would be as unethical as they ever were.

“There’s not as much stealing going these days,” he says thoughtfully, “but they’re lying more.”

Boy, that’s a relief.

*

Al Martinez’s column appears Sundays and Wednesdays. He can be reached online at al.martinez@latimes.com.