Editorial: Important questions ignored in debate

Heading into this election, our state faces many important and
complicated issues that will have to be resolved in years to come.
The partisan bickering exhibited in the gubernatorial debate
Saturday didn’t help resolve any of these problems.

California is at the forefront of the debate over undocumented
immigrants, and should lead the nation toward a resolution of the
problem.

California has about 6.5 million residents who are uninsured
(about 20 percent of the population).

California consistently ranks at the bottom in public K-12
education, and the cost of attending state university systems has
been steadily rising.

California must also come face-to-face with imminently
outgrowing much of its infrastructure, the threat of terrorism and
the threats to our economy.

Don’t worry ““ we love California ““ but this is
a big state with big problems, and it will take a lot of real work
to solve them.

Unfortunately, we saw real talk of real work buried under party
politics and meaningless jabs during the debate. What little
substance we got from gubernatorial candidates Arnold
Schwarzenegger and Phil Angelides was largely about taxes.

While taxes are an important issue for California or any state,
it’s hardly the most pressing issue facing us today.
Regardless, the debate degenerated into meaningless quips.

“I can tell by the joy you see in your eyes when you talk
about taxes, you just love to increase taxes,” Schwarzenegger
said to Angelides. “Look out there right now and just say,
“˜I love increasing your taxes.'”

It’s frightening to see political reasoning reduced to
staring deeply into a politician’s eyes.

The apparent secondary goal of the debate for both candidates
was to pin each other to the most abhorrent politicians each could
think up.

“The fact is, when you speak like this you sound just like
Newt Gingrich,” Angelides said. “You sound like Speaker
Hastert. You sound like George Bush attacking me on
taxes.”

On Schwarzenegger’s side, the goal was to link Angelides
to former Gov. Gray Davis. “During the most incredible
decline of our economy, just a few years ago, you were part of
that,” Schwarzenegger said.

On top of the politicians not saying much of anything, no one
heard much of anything either. The only scheduled debate between
these two candidates for governor was scheduled for 6 p.m., a time
slot that traditionally gets a low number of viewers.

On top of that, the debate was scheduled at the same time as two
college football games ““ between Cal and Oregon and between
UCLA and Arizona ““ and a playoff game between the L.A.
Dodgers and New York Mets.

It’s likely that someone didn’t really want people
to tune in. That’s unfortunate for California, which is
sorely in need of some good leadership with some good ideas.

So to recap: There was a debate Saturday that really
didn’t say anything and that nobody really watched.

Just how should Californians decide who to cast their votes for
on Nov. 7? Well, the campaign ads haven’t exactly been
informative, but hopefully we can start up some quality discussion
between Schwarzenegger and Angelides.

Unsigned editorials represent a majority opinion of the
Daily Bruin Editorial Board.