THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 9, 1994 TAG: 9409090045
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A16 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 71 lines
Tuesday night's debate among Virginia's four candidates for the U.S. Senate certainly scored points as the liveliest so far. Most of the attention has focused on former Gov. L. Douglas Wilder's forceful injection of the ``character'' issue into the race - Sen. Charles Robb's marital and legal problems and Oliver North's part in the Iran-Contra affair. One of the more striking aspects of this race, however, is the agenda on which it is being fought. To varying degrees, all four candidates are using conservative rather than liberal reference points for their campaigns.
Taxes, for instance. On Tuesday night, it was Wilder who took the lead attacking Sen. Robb, not only for his decisive vote in favor of President Clinton's tax-raising budget last year but also for his vote in favor of President Bush's tax-raising budget of 1990. He also threw in Robb's previous support of a 50-cents-a-gallon gasoline tax. ``You're prepared to support any tax,'' Wilder charged.
The most heated exchanges surrounded what each candidate would do about the federal deficit. Both Wilder and North highlighted their support for giving the president line-item veto authority. North also reiterated his call for term limits and a balanced-budget amendment. Nothing wrong with those stands. But Robb scoffed, saying they would save only ``pennies.'' The senator also blurted out the line he probably wishes he could take back: that he would take food from the mouths of ``widows and orphans'' to solve the deficit.
North does indeed owe the voters a more forthcoming answer on just how he would reduce federal spending if he is serious about not touching Social Security or Medicare. (Cutting congressional salaries and perks isn't going to do the job.) It's also hard to take seriously his anecdote about his mother living on a small pension. Last time we looked, North's business was doing pretty well. Why should his mother be struggling?
Praise for Robb's ``honesty'' on federal spending, however, should be muted. Having voted for higher taxes twice in three years, he ought to know by now that raising tax rates only relieves pressure on Congress to do anything about the real cause of the federal deficit, which is unchecked government spending. And the fact that Robb was apparently unable to get a president and Congress of his own party to seriously consider entitlement cuts does not speak well for the degree of his influence.
Wilder, however, was the undoubted star of the show, not merely for his aggressive stance (he has little to lose) but because he takes positions that are highly unconventional for a black politician. In addition to his stand against higher taxes, he joined Robb in coming out in favor of a strike on North Korea's nuclear facilities (Coleman and North gave unclear answers), but opposed an invasion of Haiti, an action favored by the Congressional Black Caucus.
With the single exception of abortion, on which all the candidates except North played variations on the pro-choice theme, liberal issues have been conspicuous by their absence. No one is promising to nationalize the health-care industry, for instance. And for all his efforts to paint North as an ``extremist,'' Robb does not appear to be going out of his way to call attention to some of his own edge-of-the-envelope issues, such as allowing open homosexuals to serve in the military.
Clearly, all of the candidates have sensed what first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton complained about recently, which is that the mood of the public has shifted away from government as a solution for real or perceived problems. Wilder said in the debate the issue he hears the most about while campaigning is the need for crime control. Voters seem to be saying that if government can't handle its most basic function, it is probably a forlorn hope to expect it to accomplish much of anything else.
KEYWORDS: U.S. SENATE CANDIDATE ELECTION DEBATE by CNB