Leon Panetta was a failure as congressman in Santa Cruz and Monterey in the early 1970s. Smoked too much dope, and rode on the coattails of other demo politicians. He needs to go back to rolling joints with hippies.
Yeah, I know...he used to be my Congresscritter. My old partner (who was a very wealthy farmer backed him in the 70’s and he and I used to have some pretty heated discussions. I would run into Panetta at social events and kept bugging him about a flat tax (I know, pretty rude of me). I’m not taking credit but he actually introduced a flat tax bill in the early 80’s. He’s been saying lefty penance ever since.