Who is the voice of Mr. O in the Honda commercials?

Why would Silicon Valley executives and investors consider Ro Khanna to be a better representative for their interests than their incumbent Congressman, seven-term Representative Michael Honda, also a Democrat?

• http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/06/us/politics/tech-industry-flexes-muscle-in-california-race.html ... Whether or not this political start-up is ultimately successful, Mr. Khanna’s campaign underscores the tech industry’s push to elect candidates who will further its interests in Washington, even if that means, as in this race, trying to replace a party stalwart with a relative unknown. A liberal, pro-labor Democrat with a passion for civil rights, Mr. Honda, 72, is generally regarded as being on the side of the tech industry, but not as aggressive a champion as other congressmen in the region. “The tech community is looking for advocates who will be really, really outspoken for tech, and Ro fits that mold,” said Ron Conway, who is one of the industry’s most influential investors and is backing Mr. Khanna. While it is unusual for tech leaders to rally in such a way around a candidate, Mr. Conway added, “I’m hoping it’s a wave of the future that continues, because it’s crucial for the tech community to have a really active voice in Washington.” Mr. Khanna, who was a deputy assistant commerce secretary from 2009 to 2011 and now represents tech companies in intellectual property cases at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, one of Silicon Valley’s most prestigious law firms, talks of the need for “Government 2.0” and a “reset” of Congress. The author of “Entrepreneurial Nation,” a book on manufacturing and American competitiveness, he has been endorsed by Google’s executive chairman, Eric E. Schmidt; Facebook’s chief operating officer, Sheryl Sandberg; Yahoo’s chief executive, Marissa Mayer; and many other tech luminaries. After knocking on the doors of potential voters here in Sunnyvale on a recent afternoon, Mr. Khanna said of his list of tech endorsers, “Everyone who is seen as a person of the future has endorsed our campaign.” Facing a serious challenge for the first time since being elected to Congress in 2000, Mr. Honda said he represented the interests not only of tech companies but also of the wider district. “It’s about experience, the time you spent in the community, your record and people’s expectations,” he said recently, after leading a seminar on science education at Cisco’s headquarters in San Jose. At a time when the tech industry has drawn a backlash in the San Francisco Bay Area, where the tech elite are increasingly portrayed as concerned with their narrow privileges at the expense of society at large, Mr. Honda’s supporters have labeled Mr. Khanna a “Silicon Valley groupie” whose wealthy donors are trying to buy a congressional seat....

• Answer:

  Silicon Valley is in no way new to government, but we are very new to politics. It's only been recently that the industry -- specifically software -- has come to the realization the there comes a point where no matter how fast you move, you can't permanently outpace a need to influence legislation and regulation (on issues including immigration, intellectual property, and net neutrality). We like shiny, new things here in this part of the country. Representative Honda is 72 and Ro Khanna is 37. If Khanna wins and stays in, then we've got a potential of decades with him. Representative Honda has a coalition of interests to which he is obliged -- not just Technology. Now that we've learned that we can no longer afford to simply ignore Washington, we want "our guy" and we want to be the clear center of that person's attention. (The challenge, of course, is that politics is built around coalitions and Khanna doesn't have the relationships in Congress that Honda does. By running as a Democrat defying party leadership, those relationships and influence will be harder to come by.) California's new open primary system makes it easier to organize beyond traditional bounds. Rather than get hammered in the Democratic primary, he and Honda will likely advance to Election Day as the top two. (It is, however, a midterm and Honda has a better shot at winning the electorate that will actually show up.)