LAWLESS TAKES AIM AT LANGEVIN'S RECORD

ROVIDENCE - Underdog challenger Jennifer Lawless did her best to paint incumbent 2nd District Rep. Jim Langevin as a Bush-supporting, abortion-opposing clone of Sen. Joseph Lieberman as the two squared off in the first head-to-head meeting of their Democratic primary contest.

Asserting that she would "bring real Democratic leadership" to Rhode Island and Washington, Lawless, a Brown University professor, said, "over the last six years and on a wide range of vitally important issues, Rep. Langevin has sided with President Bush and the Republicans instead of Rhode Island's working families.

Lieberman, a previously popular senator who was the Democratic candidate for vice president in 2000, was defeated in a primary in his home state of Connecticut because, many observers said, he was perceived as too close to the Bush administration on key issues such as the war in Iraq.

While the 2nd District race at first looked like it would become a one-issue fight over abortion - Lawless favors abortion rights while Langevin opposes the practice - Lawless has since branched out to call Langevin to task on other issues.

"From the war in Iraq, to reproductive freedom to rights of privacy, he has let Rhode Islanders down," Lawless said of Langevin. "We deserve a representative who is going to fight back against President Bush's agenda. Rep. Langevin has had six years to do it and too often he has failed. Whether it is the war in Iraq and helping the president by voting almost a dozen times to stay the course or working against defending a woman's right to choose by casting 27 votes against women's reproductive freedom, or demonstrating no respect for the right of privacy. He voted against medical marijuana, he voted to intervene in the (Terry) Schiavo case (a woman in Florida in a vegetative state whose husband ordered her feeding tube removed, ultimately ending her life), he voted for the Patriot Act. That's wrong and that's out of synch with Rhode Islanders."

Langevin brushed off the attempt to tie him to the Bush administration.

"My record is very clear in opposition to President Bush and the Republican agenda," the three-term congressman said after the debate. "I think it is wrong for Rhode Island families and wrong for working families across America.

"I did not support the war; I voted no on the Iraq war and have been a constant critic of the war in Iraq. I have called for (Secretary of Defense) Don Rumsfeld's resignation and most recently I voted against a resolution that would have endorsed President Bush's 'stay the course' philosophy in Iraq because we need to change direction.

For his part, Langevin told the statewide RIPBS audience who saw the debate live that national security means more than military security or homeland security.

"It's also about providing family security, things families need and depend on, like health care security, housing security, education security, environmental security and energy security."

Langevin and Lawless are scheduled to face each other this weekend on WJAR-TV's 10 News Conference.

The winner of the Sept. 12 primary will face Independent candidate Rod Driver in November. There is no Republican candidate for the 2nd District House seat.
For his part, Driver was miffed about being left out of the debate, which was held by the League of Women Voters.

"When the League of Women Voters' decided to schedule a debate between just the two Democrats running in Rhode Island's second congressional district it made the League look like an arm of the Democratic Party," Driver said in a written statement.

"My candidacy became visible via newspaper ads starting in December 2005 and TV ads which started in March 2006," Driver said. "Yet when I asked about my invitation to the Aug. 30 debate, I was told that the League was inviting only the Democrats."

"This might be acceptable if the League were also committed to having a debate between the surviving candidates after the primary," he said. "But the president of the League offered no such assurance."

This article, written by Jim Baron, appeared on August 31, 2006 on the front page of the Warwick Daily Times.