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« Aviation agency could have saved on OT costs, audit finds |MainOctober 10, 2010Kirk and Giannoulias trade ethics shots on 'Meet the Press'Share|
Posted by Oscar Avila at 9:50 a.m.
U.S. Senate candidates Mark Kirk and Alexi Giannoulias traded sharp attacks on each other’s character and credibility this morning in a wide-ranging debate televised on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
The character question remains front-and-center in their bid to fill President Obama’s old Senate seat as polls show voters hold deep doubts after scathing reports of Democrat Giannoulias’ tenure at the failed Broadway Bank and of Republican Kirk embellishing his record in the Navy Reserve.
The debate aired live in parts of the country but airs locally at 11 a.m. after NBC’s coverage of the Chicago Marathon.
Moderator David Gregory pressed Giannoulias, Illinois' state treasurer, on whether he knew his family’s bank lent money to convicted criminals with ties to organized crime. Giannoulias, a senior loan officer at the time, did not claim total ignorance of their “colorful pasts” but said “I didn’t know the extent of their activity.”
Kirk did not disavow campaign ads equating Giannoulias with television mobster Tony Soprano and said the candidate should have known better because the criminal convictions had been widely reported in local newspapers.
“You don’t have to pull their rap sheet,” said Kirk, a five-term congressman.
Giannoulias, who has portrayed Kirk as a Washington, D.C. insider, said Kirk didn't know what it's like to work in the private sector. "Again... the congressman has never worked in the private sector. Doesn't know what it takes, what a bank does when they look at whether or not to approve or deny a loan so he pulls some names and tries to make a political attack," Giannoulias said. " People aren't buying it."
Gregory, meanwhile, pressed Kirk, an intelligence officer in the Navy Reserve, as to why he embellished parts of his military record. Gregory read off a string of examples, including that Kirk came under enemy fire in Iraq, that he ran the Pentagon war room, served in the Gulf War, and that he was named the Navy's intelligence officer of the year.
Kirk did not fully explain how the exaggerations occurred but said, “I am completely accountable for this.”
Giannoulias tried to use the misstatements to cast broader doubts on Kirk’s candidacy. As Kirk rattled off examples of how he bucked Republican leadership, including supporting stem-cell research, Giannoulias wasn’t having it.
“The truth is that the only thing he’s been independent of in this race is the truth,” Giannoulias said.
Likewise, Giannoulias implied that Kirk’s misstatements on his military record should lead voters to question his other claims, including that he would be a “fiscal hawk” and take on the ballooning budget deficit.
“The congressman has told some real whoppers during this campaign, but that might be the biggest one of all,” Giannoulias said. “Congressman, saying you’re a fiscal hawk doesn’t necessarily make it true.”
Much of the policy debate centered on whether Obama’s economic policies have worked.
Kirk said the health care and financial reform bills had the net effect of being tax increases. Kirk held up a chart – a la former presidential candidate Ross Perot – to show that the administration’s economic policies, including the stimulus package, have only swelled the debt without truly creating jobs.
“We recognize that the stimulus has largely failed,” Kirk said.
"The key danger," Kirk said, "is will our policies increase the chance of a double-dip recession?"
While he did not agree with all the details, Giannoulias said the stimulus package helped the U.S. avoid a “second Great Depression.”
“I think (Obama) has done everything he can to turn this economy around,” Giannoulias said.
Posted at 09:51:21 AMin 2010 Illinois election, 2010 Illinois U.S. Senate campaignCommentsVerify your CommentPreviewing your CommentPosted by: |
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