Mark Pera and his wife, Leslie, attended the local
Democracy for America meeting at
La Majada in Oak Park. Pera is running for Congress against
Dan Lipinski in the Democratic primaryin February, 2008.
I interviewed Pera before, but it was good to see him field questions from others. Both he and his wife are physically attractive people. Pera's wife is a management or financial sector professional currently working on privatizing portions of the United Kingdom's health care system.
Pera made it clear that he's going to be a consensus builder and rejects strident, ideological politics. The good of this is that he will probably be a productive member of Congress. The bad is that I could definitely see him getting behind something like the Iraq War because the Beltway class portrayed opposition to the war as being limited to extremists. Pera did refer negatively to “extremists” within the Democratic Party.
In my previous interview Pera emphasized getting involved in transportation issues. The district includes Midway Airport as well as rail lines and Interstate. In front of DFA Pera showed passion for environmental issues. Since he prosecutes and litigates environmental and utility matters for the Cook County State's Attorney it makes sense for him to serve on a committee dealing with these issues.
Pera reiterated a few issues where he contrasts with Lipinski. Pera is pro-abortion rights and pro-stem cell research. Lipinski is opposed to abortion even in cases of rape and incest. Pera is for rapidly withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq. Lipinski has been mostly supportive of Bush's Iraq policy.
Pera took heat from the audience on various issues. Pera favored improving access to health care, but didn't provide details about how to do this. He cited Hillary Rodham Clinton as being a health care expert with unlimited access to other experts and she has yet to formulate a plan. Pera's wife seemed quite influential on his thinking about health care. Pera criticized countries with universal health care systems because of issues of “rationing” health care. I criticized this language forcefully and argued that the U.S. system performs poorly by any measure. After hearing from the audience Pera and his wife seemed to be rethinking their position on health care. They seemed most persuaded by the argument that health care costs were stifling small business and big business.
Pera also described Iran acquiring nuclear weapons as a threat to U.S. security. He prefers diplomacy, but would be open to using military force.
I tried to give credit to Pera for doing a good job running
Lyons Township High School. He's the president of the board of education. Pera demurred and said credit should go to the superintendent and other professional staff.
Pera also took some grief over gay marriage. Pera favors civil unions, not gay marriage.
Labels: Democracy for America, Mark Pera
