POLITICAL LANDSCAPE:Keeping dad’s campaign in family

While some presidential candidates have changed spouses more than once, the only family affair for former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney seems to be his campaign.

Everyone’s pitching in, including Tagg Romney, who gave up a job with the Los Angeles Dodgers to join what currently passes for the family business — helping dad get elected president.

Tagg talked about the campaign and California’s importance during a visit to Newport Beach Tuesday.

At 37, Tagg is the oldest of Mitt’s five sons.

He was living in La Cañada and working as chief marketing officer for the Dodgers when, after “a lot of debate,” he and his wife decided to move their family back to Massachusetts so he could work on his father’s campaign.

Two of his brothers are also full-time employees of the campaign, and another is helping out part-time — the fifth is excused because he’s in medical school, Tagg said.

After Iowa and New Hampshire, much attention will be focused on winning support in California — with its primary moved up to Feb. 5, “It’s going to play a vital role, there’s no question,” Tagg said.

Mitt isn’t doing too well in national polls, Tagg said — about 70% of Republicans don’t know enough about him to form an opinion, so that’s what they’re working on.

“My dad’s biggest challenge is getting enough people to know who he is,” Tagg said.

While the media has questioned how voters will view the Romneys’ Mormon faith, Tagg said the people he meets on the campaign trail don’t ask a lot of questions about it.

“Take a look at my dad’s life, the way he’s lived, the way he’s raised his family. If you find any problem with it, don’t vote for him,” Tagg said. “What church he attends on Sunday isn’t particularly relevant to how he’d govern as president.”

Being the son of a presidential candidate doesn’t seem to faze Tagg any more than being a governor’s son.

“I consider myself the son of Mitt Romney, not the son of a presidential candidate,” he said. “For me, when this is all over I’ll go back to my private life and my career.”

Huntington Beach Rep. Dana Rohrabacher this week renewed his call for a U.S. boycott of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, citing a human rights record he considers atrocious.

Earlier this month Rohrabacher proposed a resolution that would prompt Congress to move toward a boycott unless China ends human rights abuses in its own country and stops supporting them in Sudan, Burma and North Korea.

In a letter to House colleagues Wednesday, he criticized China’s treatment of Falun Gong practitioners, the country’s purchase of oil from Sudan, its sale of arms to Burma’s dictatorial ruler, and other incidents.

“The host city of Beijing is putting on a show, ridding the city of the homeless, the sick and the destitute,” Rohrabacher wrote in the letter. “To participate in these games and stand idly by in the face of such atrocities would be a great sin of omission. We urge you to support H. Res. 610 and boycott the Beijing Olympics.”