Democratic Debate Focuses on Economy : Politics: While 5 ‘major candidates’ battle it out, ex-Irvine Mayor Agran blasts forum’s organizers for refusing to invite him.

The five Democratic presidential contenders thrashed out their differences over the economy, health care and education Friday night in a sometimes rancorous televised debate, trying to get their candidacies back on track after the most turbulent week of the 1992 campaign.

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton sought to use the two-hour confrontation, which focused mainly on economic policy, to return to the issues that made him the presumed front-runner in the race before he was forced to defend himself against unsubstantiated allegations of marital infidelity.

He stressed his experience as a governor, a post in which he said he had served on “the cutting edge of change,” and his moderate approach to reviving the economy.

“The thing that bothers me is not that people make money,” he said at one point. “I’d like to create more millionaires than (Presidents Ronald) Reagan or Bush did. . . . What you want is more income equality, and you want people to make money the old-fashioned way, by investing in our goods, our products and our services. And that’s what the Democrats ought to be about.”

His rivals--former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown, Jr., Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, Nebraska Sen. Bob Kerrey and former Massachusetts Sen. Paul E. Tsongas--sought to use the debate to draw attention to their own remedies for the nation’s economic woes.

At a Washington press conference, former Irvine Mayor Larry Agran, waging a long-shot campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, sharply criticized the Public Broadcasting Service and the “MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour” for refusing to invite him to participate in the Friday night debate.

Sounding a familiar theme, Agran said his exclusion represents “an affirmative and aggressive act of political censorship.” He added, “I am a serious candidate who, without doubt, should be included in each and every event.”

Later, an aide said that the Agran campaign on Friday filed suit in U.S. District Court in Chicago asking the federal bench to establish guidelines for the inclusion of candidates in future debates broadcast by PBS, which is largely financed by federal taxpayers.

The aide said Agran attorneys believe there is precedent for the courts to intervene in issues involving access to publicly financed programming. The suit did not seek to halt Friday’s debate and does not address Agran’s exclusion from debates carried by private television networks.

Agran campaign officials reported Friday that the campaign raised a total of $156,024 in contributions in 1991 and received more than $40,000 in loans, including at least $20,000 from Agran himself. All but $9,170 of those funds were reported to have been spent by Dec. 31.

At the debate, Tsongas gave his reason for seeking the nomination.

“I decided to run to rescue the nation’s economy,” Tsongas said. “You cannot do that with giveaways and tax breaks. I’m not running to be Santa Claus. I’m running to be President. My job is to rescue this country so people can have a job . . . so they can provide for their families.”

While Tsongas contended the Democratic Party needed to shift away from its tradition of liberal activism in economic policy, Harkin sought to reaffirm and renew that legacy.

“What I’m calling for is a new New Deal,” Harkin said. “I want to say let’s start focusing on people, let’s put them to work, start educating our kids and let’s have a national health insurance program. That’s bottom-up, percolate-up economics, not trickle-down economics.”

Brown, who has cast himself as the anti-Establishment candidate and the champion of voter resentment, said: “I think people are frustrated. They’re angry. They look out at America and they know we’re strong; we’re the richest country in the world and yet . . . our automobile industry is declining, our ports are not competing . . . our cities are deteriorating.

“We need real reform. We have to reform the politics, the tax code, the industrial policy, our health system. And as we do that, we will be . . . in the beginning of a golden age.”

Kerrey urged adoption of an “industrial policy that focuses on the training and skills of our people.”

He added: “Our gasoline tank is empty because we haven’t invested in plants and equipment. Business people are clipping coupons instead of investing in things that create jobs. And we’ve let the foundation--our transportation and communication system--deteriorate.”

The charges of infidelity against Clinton surfaced only at the very end of the debate, during a discussion of character as a campaign issue. “What is the biggest character issue out there right now?” asked Brown. “It’s the stories on Bill Clinton, isn’t it, and whether there’s an issue there or whether there isn’t and whether or not it betokens a respect for women.”

Kerrey responded that the focus on the adultery issue--sparked by an Arkansas woman’s claim, published in a supermarket tabloid, that she and Clinton had been involved in an affair for 12 years--is “not legitimate. What’s legitimate is our issues, our ideas, our agenda. That’s what’s legitimate in this campaign.”

Brown then said: “Every time a woman makes a claim, she’s always viewed as lying or a bimbo.”

Clinton, who has strongly denied the woman’s allegations and who has appeared on CBS-TV’s “60 Minutes” Sunday with his wife to discuss his personal life, was asked if he wanted to reply. He said: “I think I’ve said all I need to say about that. And I think the American people have got more of me and my wife and our life together than they ever thought they’d get in this primary process.”

The two-hour debate was staged at a public television station studio in suburban Virginia and moderated by PBS newsmen Jim Lehrer and Robert MacNeil. While the candidates spent much of their time castigating Bush--especially his State of the Union address earlier this week--they also engaged in several critical sharp exchanges among themselves.

One of the sharpest of these erupted during a discussion of the health care issue. It came after Clinton declared: “If one of us gets elected President, we’ll have national health care for everybody. Any one of these (programs) will save $100 billion over the way we’re going.”

That angered Kerrey, who has made a national health insurance plan the centerpiece of his campaign and claims more expertise on the issue than any of his rivals.