Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, January 27, 1995 TAG: 9501280031
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A6/INTL EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
\ A day after skewering the town, the job and his new congressional colleagues in a hilarious monologue, Sonny Bono was still hot.
On Wednesday night, expectations for freshman Rep. Bono - the closing act at the Washington Press Club Foundation dinner - were not high. But it soon became clear that Cher's ex was nobody's naif, and in fact a wit to be reckoned with.
By Thursday, his fellow lawmakers were congratulating him on the House floor and buzzing among themselves. C-Span was swamped with requests to view the tape of the event and had to start taking reservations.
Bono, a California Republican, told the dinner audience his original ambition was to be a senator: ``It appeared like they could tell anyone to go to hell and they would say, `Yessir. Thank you and God bless you.''' But the restaurateur and former Palm Springs mayor, still best known as half of the 1960s duo Sonny & Cher, had to settle for the House.
Gathering material for his extemporaneous speech, Bono observed closely Wednesday as Rep. Bob Dornan, R-Calif., got himself gagged for making a harsh remark on the House floor about President Clinton.
``I said, `Bob, why did you DO that?''' Bono said. ``Bob says, `I'll be on C-Span every hour. Who cares?'''
``So I love this game,'' Bono continued seamlessly. ``I am so pleased that we are all so dedicated to mankind - unlike show business, where there you have egomaniacs and you have powermongers and you have elitists.''
Dornan, who like all of Bono's targets was seated in the room, took repeated hits. ``He doesn't care, when you talk to him, what you're saying or why you're saying it or even if you're there,'' Bono told his convulsed audience. ``So I'm talking to Bob Dornan, but he's not listening at all, but I thought he was...'' On Thursday, Dornan clasped Bono by both shoulders in the Speaker's Lobby off the House floor. He invited Bono to breakfast and pledged to look him in the eye forevermore.
``Bob, you got a minute?'' Dornan asked himself, pretending to be Bono.
``Sonny, I got 30,'' he answered himself and waved to an imaginary secretary. ``Cancel everything on my schedule.''
``You're a good sport and I knew you were a good sport,'' Bono said.
Bono had said Wednesday night that he hoped to learn a thing or two from the lightning-tongued Frank, part of a Democratic team charged with driving the new GOP majority nuts on the floor.
``He does the best Shecky Green I've ever heard. He can fly from one mike to another...,'' said Bono, adding, ``Barney, I want to keep watching you, if you don't mind, because you're the best I've ever seen. I haven't figured out what the hell you do, but it is good.''
Frank said Thursday that he had secured a correction - that Bono had really meant to compare him to Buddy Hackett. Aside from that, he said, ``It was somewhat flattering to be Sonny's role model.''
Bono said he was still trying to figure out the meaning of a remark he heard Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, make to an audience:
``You can't eat corn if you ain't a pig.''
``I said to my wife, `What the hell does that mean?,''' he recalled. ``Everybody clapped. They knew what he was talking about.''
by CNB