Candidates should all participate in debates

In the Fifth District, the debate over the debate has already begun and it is just barely summer. Depending on how this turns out, the voters could end up being the losers.

State Sen. Robert Hurt of Chatham won the Republican primary earlier this month against an array of Tea Party candidates. He will face off against incumbent Rep. Tom Perriello, a Democrat from Albemarle County. Hurt said initially he would be willing to debate Perriello and independent Jeffrey Clark, a Tea Party member from Danville. Clark says he is running because Hurt isn’t conservative enough.

Unfortunately for the district’s voters, Hurt has changed his mind about including Clark in the debate or debates. In a statement released last weekend, the GOP candidate said, “We cannot allow the important debate in this election to be sidetracked by a candidate who is not serious about his campaign or his ability to win.”

A week earlier, Hurt told The Daily Progress in Charlottesville that he was “absolutely” willing to appear at debates with Clark and Perriello during the campaign.

He even offered substantial reasons why debates are important to any election, saying that “debates are a very, very important part of elections and obviously we want to make ourselves available to all of the citizens who will be judging us and we’re committed to doing that but obviously we have the details to work out. ...”

Hurt later said, however, that the newspaper incorrectly reported his response to whether he would include Clark in the debate. Further, he clarified he is not willing to debate Clark and suggested that Perriello has “jumped on the opportunity to dodge a head-on debate with me.”

Perriello’s campaign agreed that Clark should be allowed to participate in the upcoming debates. The congressman said he has learned from his first 18 months in Congress that “there are a whole lot of opinions across our district. Some of these viewpoints are represented by Sen. Hurt and some by Mr. Clark, and I look forward to a substantive, honest campaign that brings these discussions more clearly into the public arena. I strongly agree with Sen. Hurt that Mr. Clark should be included in public debates and I look forward to a spirited discussion with both of them.”

For his part, Clark said he is serious about his campaign and wants to have a voice in any debates. Reflecting on why Hurt doesn’t want him in any debates, he said, “If we’re allowed in the debate, it makes the whole dynamic a whole lot murkier for him. It won’t be as easy for him to distinguish himself from Tom Perriello.”

As Hurt has already acknowledged, debates in political campaigns are all about the exchange of ideas and proposals for representative government. Where better to present those ideas than at a debate among the candidates — all the candidates for a particular office?

When Republican Robert Hurt says he won’t debate one of the candidates, he’s shortchanging himself and the voters.

That doesn’t bode well for the important campaign that is shaping up in Virginia’s Fifth District.