Glendale: It's A Debate, Harpool: It's a Debate, Champion: It's Not a Debate

The debate over the debate continues.

David Woodruff, a Democratic campaign adviser for State Senate candidate Doug Harpool, says he believes Thursday's meeting between Sen. Norma Champion and Harpool "is a debate."

"The high school students believe it's a debate. Doug Harpool believes it's a debate. Norma Champion's the only one who thinks it's not a debate," Woodruff said.

In a wide-ranging interview Monday, Sen. Champion said she didn't agree to any debates with Harpool because "they are a waste of time."

But a Glendale High School debate team that organized the Champion-Harpool face-off says they are considering their event a debate.

When I asked Champion why she would not agree to a debate with Harpool, she said voters "are sick of them." "You can talk to anyone about the Talent-McCaskill debates, they said they didn't learn anything. They are not very useful. They set up a platform for one candidate to distract attention to another candidate. They get to be name-calling kinds of things," Champion said.

Harpool promised he would not call Champion any kinds of names. "I'm an issue-oriented person," Harpool said. "I'm not going to call her a liar and a cheat the way Sen. Talent did to Claire McCaskill. I'm not going to do that. I'm going to ask her why she voted the way she did,"
he said.

Champion said she believes candidate forums are more informative. "I think the debates, the way they've been handled, I think they are a waste of time. I don't see any advantage for me to have a debate."

Maia Tagami, the vice-president of the Glendale student political debate club organizing the event, said five student panelists will ask both candidates 14 questions. "It has the foundation of a debate. We'll ask questions and give each candidate 2 minutes to respond and then have follow-ups," Tagami said.

Tagami said the questions will focus on the November ballot issues, a proposed city ban on minors in bars, Medicaid, rising tuition costs and same sex marriage. "It's set up to be more of a discussion, but both will be on a stage facing student panelists," Tagami said.

When I asked Tagami whether the questions were given to the candidates in advance, she said they were, at the request of Sen. Champion. "I know she was reluctant to agree to it in the first place, but we're really excited about it," Tagami said.

Tagami said because they are expecting such a large crowd the venue for the face-off has been changed to the Glendale High School Auditorium. "It's really exciting because it's a big race," Tagami said. "We're expecting a large crowd and it's great because we want to show that teenagers do care about politics and issues."

So here's the rundown one more time:
Champion vs. Harpool
Thursday, Oct. 26th
Glendale High School Auditorium
3:15-4:30 p.m.

Good for these kids.

Apparently, the Glendale students were able to pull off organizing a State Senate debate, when noone else -- including us here at KY3 -- could.

Major kudos to the students at Glendale and the teachers and staff supporting them in this effort.