By Ray Barrington
News-Chronicle
The four candidates for Wisconsin's Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate agreed on one thing quickly at the beginning of Thursday's candidate debate:
They don't much like the incumbent, Democrat Russ Feingold.
And when they were done with Feingold, the four found they agreed on a lot of other things as well.
The candidates - Russ Darrow, Robert Gerald Lorge, Tim Michels and Robert Welch - used several similar themes in the first debate among the quartet.
The debate, sponsored by the state Republican Party, was the first of five before the state GOP convention in La Crosse May 21-23. It filled the main lounge of the Van Den Heuvel Campus Center at St. Norbert College.
Each candidate avoided direct attacks on his opponents, instead trying to find a way to distinguish himself.
Lorge, a past Republican candidate for Secretary of State and the least-funded of the four, said "I don't think big money interests or D.C. insiders should decide the race." He said the U.S. Senate was "out of control and not in touch with the people."
Michels, a Brownsville businessman making his first run for office, cited his experience in the military, then running the family construction business.
"I understand job creation, excess taxation and regulation," he said.
The other businessman in the race, car dealer Russ Darrow, called himself "the right Russ" to be in the Senate, adding his need to please customers would carry over into a Senate office.
Welch, who lost a previous Senate run for Senate, said he was "running not on sound bites but on 20 years of record. The Redgranite state Senator called himself "the only candidate who's won an election, and the only one who hasn't given money to Democrats."
He also cited a variety of endorsements, from the National Rifle Association to the Wisconsin Professional Police Association.
Darrow countered by saying "My objective is to win the endorsement of the voters." Michels noted that money couldn't buy a race, citing a primary campaign for U.S. Senate in Illinois where a candidate spent $27 million and lost.
"The guy who won that was a state senator, so I think that's a really good example," Welch quipped.
But if there was little separating the four, there was unanimity on their belief that Feingold has to go.
"Times have changed since 9-11 and Russ Feingold hasn't," said Michels. "I believe in everything Russ Feingold doesn't believe in."
"He's been there two terms," Darrow said, "and mostly worked on campaign finance reform. There's not one single thing he has done.
The four cited his votes against the USA Patriot Act and the forming of the Department of Homeland Security.
"You can't keep voting against everything and still vote for the majority of the people of Wisconsin," Darrow said.
Lorge called Feingold out of touch with "the family values and cultural wars" for his votes on abortion issues and federal judges.
And Welch waxed poetic: "How do I differ from Russ Feingold? Let me count the ways..."
On other issues, the four agreed that trade issues had to be handled fairly to protect free trade, and that the U.S. had to deal more harshly with China on such issues as currency and theft of intellectual property.
"We can't pretend and put up walls," Welch said. "We have to use a big stick to open up those markets. We can compete if we get a chance."
All supported changes in health care accessibility, with minor differences. Welch suggested there needed to be more of a free market in health care. "It will be cheaper if people have to pay out of their own pocket," he said, urging health savings accounts.
Lorge, an attorney, suggested putting malpractice insurance in a workers' compensation-style system and requiring family group policies be bid on in an open market to avoid companies picking off the most healthy applicants.
Michels echoed an advertisement he started running in the Green Bay market, saying the U.S. should allow the importing of legal prescription drugs from Canada, something the Bush administration haws fought.
Michels was also the only one of the four to say he would voluntarily step down after two terms in the Senate.
When questioned about the budget deficit, Lorge said the country needed people who voted on principle to bring stability, and suggested the Health and Human Services budget could be cut by 30 percent.
Michels said he was against the president's plans for a manned flight to Mars, and Darrow cited a need to cut spending for state projects from the budget, adding that Wisconsin gets very little in that type of spending.
"We're No. 49, the No. 50 state is Nevada, and I don't even think they apply," he said. All expressed support for the war in Iraq, saying that the casualties were necessary to bring stability to the region.
"They're fighting us not in New York City, but in Baghdad," Welch said.
The debate, which lasted just over an hour, featured questions from panelists Valerie Lego of WGBA-TV Channel 26, Scott Patrick of WTAQ-AM 1360 and Tom Perry of the Green Bay Press-Gazette.
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