Joel Fox is president of the Small Business Action Committee. Before coming down hard on California’s legislature in a panel on the future of direct democracy, he condemned the high price of movie tickets and mused on fashion (admitting that he’s not much of a judge) and baseball in the green room.
Q. What’s your favorite sport to watch?
A. Baseball. I like all sports, actually.
Q. Can you wear white after Labor Day?
A. You know, I ask that question all the time, and I am the least fashion judge-and-jury there is, so if it looks good on me, the answer is yes.
Q. What’s the last thing you bought and then returned?
A. I almost returned a pair of running shoes, but I decided to keep them.
Q. If you could be anyone in history, who would you be?
A. I once wrote a book about this woman who was bewitched in colonial America, and she lives to modern times-but she doesn’t age, so to keep her identity hidden, she has to have different lives. And she always admired actors who could play different roles. I’d want to be so many different people-I lived through that by writing the book.
Q. What’s the last thing that inspired you?
A. When President Obama gave a Congressional Medal of Honor to a marine recently-and the marine’s story.
Q. How much is too much to pay for a movie ticket?
A. What they’re charging now is too much to pay for a movie ticket, and they’re going to learn that lesson! It shouldn’t be more than $9.00, $8.00.
Q. When’s the last time you took public transportation?
A. When I was up in San Francisco, BART.
Q. What frustrates you?
A. Celebrity worship. It really gets under my skin.
Q. What item would you bid for on eBay?
A. I don’t do eBay. I like history, so maybe a historical document signed by an American president.
Q. What’s the best gift you ever received?
A. I’m a big old Boston Red Sox fan, and someone gave me a Ted Williams shirt for my birthday. That was the best gift at a recent party.
*Photo by Aaron Salcido.