From: clarinews@clarinet.com (ANNETTE HADDAD)
Newsgroups: clari.news.politics,clari.news.politics.people,clari.news.election,biz.clarinet.sample
Subject: Calif. Democratic Convention ends on congenial note
Keywords: political parties, politics, political personalities, election
Date: 12 Apr 92 23:34:00 GMT
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	LOS ANGELES (UPI) -- State Democratic activists ended their annual
convention Sunday on an unusual congenial note as they prepared to mount
a frontal assault to defeat President Bush and win two U.S. Senate seats
in the fall.
	The lack of dissension among the 2,300 delegates attending the
California Democratic Party's convention was due in large measure to the
state of the nation that has provided the Democrats a chance of winning
the White House for the first time in 12 years.
	State party Chairman Phil Angelides hailed the party's unified front
as the best weapon to beat the Republicans in the fall general election
campaign.
	``We didn't give you the dog fight and cat fight you've come to
expect from the Democratic Party,'' he said.
	The only moment of negativity came during a speech by Rep. Mel
Levine, D-Los Angeles, a candidate for the Senate who received a round
of ``boos'' from delegates when he proudly announced his vote in support
for the Persian Gulf War.
	``I cast that vote only after waging an eight-year crusade to stop
the Republicans from arming Saddam Hussein,'' Levine said in response,
almost as if he was expecting the negative audience reaction.
	Two years ago, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Dianne Feinstein
trumpeted the negative response she received from party activists who
opposed her pro-death penalty stand, using a video clip in a television
ad that appealed to conservative voters.
	Levine, who is seeking the six-year seat being vacated by Sen. Alan
Cranston, sought to portray himself as less reactionary than his two
opponents -- Rep. Barbara Boxer of Greenbrae and Lt. Gov. Leo McCarthy --
particularly in the area of foreign policy.
	But Levine withheld from criticizing Boxer's writing of 143 bad
checks in the House Bank scandal, although he has been running TV ads
reminding voters he wrote none.
	``Today it has become trendy for some Democratic leaders on the left
to join with Republican leaders on the far right to argue that now,
after the Cold War, America should come home and completely sever our
ties with the international community,'' he said. ``I will not be a
party to that isolationist line.''
	Boxer, whose supporters packed into a giant ballroom waving black-
and-gold plackards, shot back, saying taxpayers' money spent defending
foreign nations would be better spent ``at home.''
	``It's time to take care of our own,'' she said. ``Some will tell you
it's trendy isolationism. I say it's common sense.''
	McCarthy followed a similar tact, portraying himself as a defender of
``working people'' while taking a dig at his two Congress-member
opponents.
	``As a U.S. senator, I will use every ounce of political strength I
can muster to kill any programs that export our jobs, the way our
representatives and our president should have done,'' he said.
	But generally the Senate candidate speeches, coming on the final day,
were less accusatory and focused more on positive themes as the
Democrats convened to form their strategy for winning the White House,
two U.S. Senate seats and a host of local elections in 1992.
	Although no explicit pact was made among the candidates to refrain
from attacking each other, all agreed ``the focus should be on beating
the Republicans,'' Angelides said.
	``We've established a dynamic where there's a lot more collegiality
and a lot more sense of teamwork than before,'' he said.
	In 1990, the state party was criticized for doing too little to win
the governorship, which the Democrats lost by a margin of 1.7 percent.
	Presidential candidate and former governor Jerry Brown addressed
delegates on Saturday. Democratic front-runner Bill Clinton was unable
to attend due to a bad case of laryngitis.
	However, Clinton, who is intending to wage a tough battle to win
California's June 2 primary over favorite son Brown, will be in
California Wednesday to kick off his campaign in the state.
	Additionally, the appearance of Democratic National Committee
Chairman Ronald Brown on Saturday underscored the importance Democrats
have made the state in the national election. Almost like a mantra,
party leaders told reporters again and again that no president has won
the White House without winning California, which offers 54 electoral
votes, or one-fifth the total.
	Delegates also heard from the three candidates running for the two-
year Senate seat up currently held by Republican John Seymour but will
be up for grabs in November. The winner in November will serve out the
remaining term of Pete Wilson, who won the governorship in 1990 and
appointed Seymour.
	Former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, the projected front-
runner who narrowly lost to Wilson two years ago, played up, like Boxer,
the 98-2 ratio of men to women serving in the Senate.
	But she also touched on the chords of ``America first,'' depicting
Republicans as primarily concerned with helping foreign partners at the
expense of a spelling out a domestic policy agenda.
	``The world has changed but they can't see it in Washington,''
Feinstein said. ``For today, our greatest national security threat is
our domestic homefront.''
	Feinstein is being challenged by state Controller Gray Davis, who has
positioned himself as the more liberal of the two and who reminded
delegates of his strong support from organized labor, which has been hit
hard by the recession.
	``We need a government policy that will retrain workers and put
Americans back to work,'' he said.
	He also advocated withholding spending the so-called peace dividend
that will result from less military-industrial ventures ``until we have
a modern Marshall Plan in place '' to retrain aerospace workers.
	San Francisco attorney Joseph Alioto Jr. is also running for the two-
year seat.
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