Warren Beatty doesn't want the job. Nor does Phil Jackson or Rob Reiner or Eli Broad.
On the eve of the 45th mayoral race since the founding of modern Los Angeles, this piece could start off with a lament: Nobody's interested. T.C. Boyle is working on a novel and is too busy to talk about things like elections. It could go on about how in some cities politics vie with sports as the stuff of idle chit-chat and deep sentiment, a staple, a fix, a thrill, a comfort, a conversation, a passing exchange or an impassioned debate to be had with the mail carrier or the neighbor or the co-worker or the supermarket checkout clerk, not to mention civic leaders and thinkers and writers and artists and activists. Matt Groening isn't doing political interviews. How here, it's tough to get people to talk about the office of mayor, let alone consider running for it. Peter Ueberroth is in a meeting, always in a meeting and, sorry, unavailable to discuss it. Otis Chandler is out of the loop, doesn't really have anything to say. Jared Diamond is caught up with his book tour. How in other cities the office of mayor is a point of pride, an affirmation of place and proprietorship and sensibility. Richard Riordan's been there, done that, declines to comment. How in other cities the man himself--the current mayor--and the contenders are everywhere, on TV news, on front pages of newspapers, knocking on your door. Sherry Lansing is so preoccupied with packing up her office at Paramount that even her assistant can't return calls. How in those cities everybody has a stake. How things are at stake. Jobs and ideas and the ruling class. Because hizzoner alone has the power to unite or divide, to make a city feel its greatness and its strength. To make a city matter.
