Rep. Jane Harman (D) and Attorney General Dan Lungren (R) chat before joining Democrats Al Checchi and Lt. Gov. Gray Davis in a gubernatorial debate May 13. (Reuters)

By Ceci Connolly and William Booth
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, May 14, 1998; Page A02

LOS ANGELES, May 13—After spending record amounts of money waging war over the airwaves, the four candidates for governor finally came together today for 90 free minutes of old-fashioned politicking, mixing policy prescriptions with personal insults.

But whether California voters see the show is unknown. Although the forum aired live this morning on several cable stations, it is uncertain how much of it will edge out the nightly local television fare of car crashes, criminal mayhem and paid ads by the contenders themselves.

This is California politics 1998, where candidates are spending more money to buy more air time than ever, but where the electorate – including the news media – seem turned off and tuned out.

Meeting for the first time face-to-face before the June 2 primary, the three Democratic candidates spent much of today's debate zinging each other, as the lone Republican, state Attorney General Dan Lungren, offered a positively Reaganesque vision of California's golden future.

Here in the nation's wealthiest and arguably most influential state, Democrats are attempting to reclaim the governor's office after a 16-year drought.

Multimillionaire Democrat Al Checchi, who has spent more than $30 million of his own money, was accused by his rivals of being a "wheeler-dealer" out to buy the election with a barrage of negative ads.

Democratic Lt. Gov. Gray Davis was portrayed as a man who has spent "the last 23 years trying to move 15 feet." Davis began his career in government as chief of staff to then-Gov. Edmund G. "Jerry" Brown Jr. (D), whose office was 15 feet from Davis's.

And the third Democrat, U.S. Rep. Jane Harman, escaped relatively unscathed, dishing the dirt instead. Trailing in the polls, Harman offered herself as the motherly alternative to a field of macho men.

By and large, Lungren came under little fire from the Democrats. Indeed, he seemed the most relaxed of the candidates, smiling broadly, speaking without notes and joking about the "terrible things" the Democrats were saying about each other.

In California's new "blanket" primary, voters from any party can cross political lines to cast ballots. The Democrat with the most votes will face Lungren in the general election this November.

The latest polls put Davis leading the Democrats, with Checchi close behind. But voters so far have not paid much attention to the race. Only 6 percent in one recent poll said they were following the campaign closely, and so political observers here say it is still wide open.

In an election that has been conducted almost exclusively as a blitz of increasingly barbed television advertisements, this morning's debate was the first to be broadcast around the state, though only snippets will be shown on most television newscasts.

"This is the first time I've seen this number of cameras and number of reporters," said Lungren, chastising the electronic media for giving the campaign scant coverage and saying their neglect raises "grave questions about democracy."

Reflecting the state's rebounding fortunes, neither the candidates nor questioners from the Los Angeles Times talked much about the economy, which has recovered from the deep recession of the early 1990s and is humming along, replacing jobs lost to the end of the Cold War with twice as many in the entertainment industry.

Instead, the candidates focused repeatedly on California's dismal public education, which has fallen from a system that was the envy of the world to one that is among the lowest in per-student allocations.

In answers to questions about everything from assault rifles to affirmative action to how to spend California's $4 billion budget surplus, the candidates, including the Republican, said the solution was better schools and better teachers.

Harman, a three-term representative from the Los Angeles area, exploited her status as the only woman in the race with reminders she is "a mother of four" who wants to let women covered by HMOs choose gynecologists as their primary doctors. "I am the only member of California's diversity on this panel," said Harman, a telegenic, middle-aged blond surrounded by the three dark-haired, middle-aged men in suits and red ties.

Her strategy, crafted largely by consultants to Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and paid for by her millionaire husband, echoes Feinstein's successful campaigns, offering a blend of tough-on-crime stances with a softer leadership style. "There is a fundamental difference between the macho approach and the way a skilled, experienced woman thinks," Harman said. "I ask for your vote not because I'm a woman but as an experienced, talented leader who will bring back sensible, pragmatic and honorable leadership to all Californians."

Kam Kuwata, Harman's campaign manager, said female voters in the 1990 and 1992 Senate races decided who to support late in the campaign and helped tip the scales in favor of Feinstein and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D) respectively. If Harman is to win the primary, she must count on that trend and support from independent and Republican women.

Davis, who once seemed a nonfactor in this pricey contest, hit the theme that has helped catapult him to the top of the most recent polls. "I spent my life in public service and believe me, I have not gotten wealthy doing it," he said. "But I do have a wealth of experience."

He repeatedly urged Checchi and the others to close the primary "on a high note" absent the vitriol of the attack ads that has marked the last few weeks. He repeatedly made reference to his service in Vietnam, even using his war experience to make points on education and guns.

Checchi laid out in starkest terms the challenges confronting this massive state and his detailed, albeit costly, plan for addressing them. "For Californians the enemy of our future is complacency," he said. Spend the money now, he argued, before another 18 million people move to California over the next quarter century as predicted. As to charges he was trying to buy the election, "I would rather spend my own money and say what I mean," he replied.

The great unknown in the final 20 days of this primary campaign is how much impact Checchi's unprecedented direct-mail effort will have on the outcome. His campaign manager, Darry Sragow, said about 20 percent of the ballots cast June 2 will be mailed in and Checchi is spending millions more trying to reach those people through the mail. Both Checchi and Harman are hoping that a number of Republicans will cross over and vote for them.