Countywide : Frizzelle, Toledano Speak at UCI Forum

Abraham Lincoln and Stephen F. Douglas engaged in them. So did Kennedy and Nixon, Dukakis and Bush and, this year, Feinstein and Wilson.

But in the 69th Assembly District, which encompasses parts of Irvine, Costa Mesa, Huntington Beach, Fountain Valley, Westminster and Santa Ana, incumbent Nolan Frizzelle (R-Huntington Beach) would have no part of a debate. Instead, he insisted on separate appearances by him and his opponent, Democrat James Toledano, at UC Irvine on Tuesday.

“We asked both candidates to debate,” said Kevin Rose, a member of the UCI student association that sponsored Tuesday’s candidates forum. “Frizzelle refused.”

After a 45-minute appearance in which he delivered a campaign speech and answered students’ questions, Frizzelle said that he thinks that individual candidates’ appearances are more valuable to voters than debates.

“I have found in the debate format in the past that neither candidate gives their full convictions,” Frizzelle said. If a candidate has the floor to himself or herself, he said, “then they have a tendency to come clear and give an honest answer instead of a hedged answer.”

Toledano strongly disagreed.

“The democratic system is based on choice--informed choice,” Toledano said. “With no follow-up or rebuttal, you have a chance to swat a question away or answer it in a way that no one understands it. . . . If he is afraid to put his ideas in the marketplace of ideas, then he should resign.”

Frizzelle first addressed the crowd, which numbered about 25 students, outlining his philosophy of limited government. He said he opposes Prop. 128--the Big Green initiative--in part because it would ban substances that in small amounts are not harmful to human beings, and he called for an end to government insurance of savings and loans and banks. Frizzelle proposed that instead, private insurers step in and charge financial institutions in accordance with their lending practices and interest rates.

In response to a question about abortion, Frizzelle, who has consistently voted against government funding for abortions and is morally opposed to abortion, said he has “always supported choice if it’s thoroughly informed choice.”

Asked afterward what that meant, Frizzelle said that women should be told that “they are taking another life” and should be counseled on adoption and other alternatives. When pressed about whether he would ultimately favor allowing such “fully informed” women to have abortions if they chose, Frizzelle said, “I don’t think government should make it legal or illegal.”

Toledano, speaking after Frizzelle, said he supports Prop. 128, and he called for a much greater emphasis on education than has been heretofore given.

“For 10 years Republicans have been running against crime, but they know no solutions--they only look at it as a campaign issue,” Toledano said. “We’re building prisons for our elementary school kids but we’re not building schools for them.”