Rep. Henry Waxman: "Marathon Man"

House Energy Committee Chairman Henry Waxman's "legislative campaigns unfold over spans of time beyond the patience of most lawmakers, and sometimes defy political gravity—in the 1980s, when anything smacking of Great Society liberalism was on the chopping block, Waxman managed to expand the Medicaid program twenty-four times. It is not unusual for him to spend a decade or longer advancing a single policy goal in tiny pieces, forging unusual alliances as he needs them, or simply outlasting his opponents."

Charles Homans profiles Waxman in the May/June Issue of the Washington Monthly.