CALIFORNIA COMMENTARY THE GUBERNATORIAL PRIMARY : With Two Candidates So Close in Belief, the Choice Becomes Personal : Feinstein is not who her consultants portray her to be. If Van de Kamp loses, style will have triumphed over substance.

Watching the race for California governor, I frequently feel like the character from sci-fi movies who tries to warn unsuspecting residents that the new neighbors are not who they purport to be.

I lived in or around San Francisco for most of the time Dianne Feinstein was mayor there, moving to Los Angeles toward the end of her last term. I had the opportunity to judge her as a public official in the best way possible--day-to-day and over the course of many years. Unlike most people outside the San Francisco Bay area, I am not limited to her campaign commercials.

Feinstein is not who her consultants have portrayed her to be. She is not the best choice for governor. Atty. Gen. John K. Van de Kamp is. If Van de Kamp loses, style, inspired by consultants, will have triumphed over substance.

Compare Van de Kamp’s campaign with Feinstein’s. In addition to making known his positions on the issues, he has proposed three sweeping initiatives dealing with the environment, ethics in government and crime.

Some say this is just another campaign gimmick. If so, it’s come at a high price. Van de Kamp’s ethics-in-government initiative, for example, has alienated the Establishment in Sacramento. Not exactly the makings of a campaign gimmick.

Truth is that there is no more visible way to demonstrate what you stand for as an elected official than to propose and take responsibility for specific legislation. It is also unusual today: Most candidates and incumbents, because of expedience or lack of original thought, shy away from making specific proposals--substance is risky.

Willingness to take a stand is important, but content is also important. Substantively, the three initiatives deserve support. Even if Van de Kamp is not elected but his environmental initiative passes, it is a safe bet that he will have accomplished more to protect the environment than would a Gov. Dianne Feinstein or a Gov. Pete Wilson.

The ethics-in-government initiative is also an important proposal. Most of the attention has focused on the measure’s provisions limiting the terms of legislators and statewide elected officials. Unfortunately, this controversy has eclipsed other significant provisions. For example, California’s campaign finance laws, the result of two competing but victorious ballot measures in 1988, are unworkable. After a number of lawsuits, only bits and pieces of the two remain. An unintended and unacceptable hybrid now governs campaign finances. Van de Kamp’s ethics initiative would repeal the remnants of these measures and replace them with a solid scheme that includes an important additional component--matching funds for candidates who agree to abide by spending limits.

I also share Van de Kamp’s views on the death penalty. While he says he would not flinch when, as governor, it came time to oversee an execution, I prefer a governor--with powers of clemency--in charge who is at least personally troubled by putting people to death.

Van de Kamp’s campaign and his positions, like Van de Kamp himself, are not flashy, to be sure. They simply are substantive and innovative.

The positions that Van de Kamp takes in these initiatives are consistent with those he’s taken throughout his career. His ability to address the issues and to propose creative solutions is not questioned. This is perhaps the most important quality, just what this state needs after the eight caretaker years of the Deukmejian Administration.

In stark contrast is Feinstein’s campaign. Her chances of being elected to statewide office was always considered limited because she was unknown in Southern California, where most of the votes and money can be found. But that has not been a handicap. Just the opposite. It has given her the opportunity to create, through television, virtually any image she wants.

She has exploited that opportunity. I have been surprised to learn from her campaign that she is an activist, a person who represents the politics of the future, a “tough but caring” politician.

All very catchy. But none of this comports with her performance in San Francisco. I would have used such words as competent and efficient to describe her administration, although the $180-million budget deficit she left behind calls such descriptions into question. It is as though her campaign were describing a different person. The “tough but caring” slogan reminds me of the Monty Python description of someone as “cruel but fair.”

There are very few specifics associated with Feinstein’s candidacy. There is no way to know what she would do as governor. She has pursued a strategy of images-- images that are not rooted in fact.

Van de Kamp may not be the most dynamic person around. But he has substance. Between style and substance, I’m voting substance.