Campaign ‘94: Issues and Answers

Three candidates are running in the Nov. 8 election to represent the 46th Congressional District. They are Democrat Mike Farber of Santa Ana, Libertarian Richard G. Newhouse of Garden Grove and the incumbent, Republican Robert K. Dornan of Garden Grove. Here’s where they stand on four issues.

Health Care

Farber: “Health care reform affects all Americans. I support efforts toward providing all Americans with secure health insurance. However, we must ensure that hard-working, middle-class families and small businesses don’t bear the brunt of the cost. Employers and employees must share the financial burden. Legislative reform is also necessary to reduce medical malpractice insurance premiums and bring in line the cost of visiting a family doctor.”

Newhouse: “The Clinton socialized health care plan would reduce choice by consumers while raising costs by reducing competition. If the consumers transfer responsibility for their medical care to the government, they will learn that they have traded off their power to choose their doctor, hospital, and to control their costs to faceless bureaucrats, maybe recent immigrants from the now (collapsed) U.S.S.R.” Says he supports the Libertarian Party health care plan, which includes tax-exempt medical savings accounts, making health care expenditures 100% tax deductible, and privatizing the Medicare and Medicaid programs.

Dornan: Co-authored a bill that “relies on the free market, not the government as proposed by the President” to provide health coverage and control medical costs. Provisions include tax credits for the unemployed and working poor “to give all Americans a basic level of health relief,” reducing health care costs by controlling medical malpractice premiums, and “medical savings accounts” similar to retirement accounts that would give tax breaks to those who contribute to a fund to be used for medical bills or health insurance.

Education and Health Care Benefits for Illegal Immigrants

Farber: “Illegal immigration must be stemmed. A refusal to educate or provide health care is a ‘Band-Aid solution’ that will not help the problems associated with illegals. SOS (Save Our State initiative) will only result in putting ‘big brother’ in our schools and hospitals. A drastic increase in taxes would be needed to deal with the higher crime rate, costs to hospitals and for establishing another government bureaucracy. We need to fight for the federal funding that Orange County was promised but has not received because of the Orange County congressional delegation’s ineffectiveness.

Newhouse: “These ‘benefits’ paid by working Americans create a ‘magnet’ effect that pulls on the 5 billion people in the Second and Third worlds. This pull effect, when combined with the . . . sick economies in most of the world . . . means a flood tide of immigration. The forcible taxation of working Americans so that the non-working can get government benefits will end soon.”

Dornan: “I favor curtailing educational and some health benefits for illegal immigrants. I would never deny emergency medical aid to anyone. It is important to remember that illegal aliens--no matter where they are from--are breaking the law. Furthermore, before we deny illegal immigrants these benefits, we must first prove they are in fact in the U.S. illegally. Thus, I would hope that enactment of such a proposal would lead to more vigorous enforcement of our immigration laws.”

Crime

Farber: “The spiraling crime rate is threatening the very fabric of our society. Violence in our schools and neighborhoods cannot be tolerated. Gangsters who put our children at risk by bringing guns to school should be expelled for no less than one year. I strongly support ‘three strikes and you’re out’ for all violent criminals and efforts to address the problems in the current sentencing guidelines. Boot camps and other alternatives to regular incarceration should be implemented more often.”

Newhouse: “Crime is increasing because the economy is being strangled by the welfare state with its bureaucratic, tax-eating, regulation-producing, progress-derailing hordes of the publicly employed. ‘Demopublicans’ pander to our anxieties about crime. They want the working person to support even more prisoners at about $25,000 per prisoner per year. . . . Such costs will drive more private sector jobs out of the country, causing more unemployment, more crime, more prisons, in a circle ending in chaos. Prisons must be made self-supporting.

Dornan: “Although the federal government can do little to affect crime at the street level, it can set the national tone. Unfortunately, the Democratic crime package sets the wrong tone. A good crime bill must provide swift and sure punishment. I want to put a stop to the endless appeals that have made a mockery of the death penalty, as well as reform the rules that allow criminals to go free on technicalities. I want to build more prisons to get repeat offenders, who account for the vast majority of violent crimes, off the streets. And I want to see more cops on the beat, which is why I have been the lead sponsor of the Police Corps bill. The Police Corps . . . would establish an ROTC-type program for young people who want a career in law enforcement.

El Toro Marine Corps Air Station

Farber: “Conversion of the El Toro Air Station offers the community a number of unique opportunities. None should be dismissed without careful examination, particularly the number of jobs that would be created. From most estimates, converting the base into an international airport would be the most cost-effective use of the land. However, the people from the surrounding community must be the ones to make the final decision.”

Newhouse: “John Wayne Airport is poorly located, too small, and has no room for expansion. . . . If El Toro is converted to a full-scale commercial airport, it will provide many high-paying jobs.”

Dornan: “I have not taken a position on this issue because I believe that it is for local, not federal, officials to decide. I will support whatever reuse plan the people of Orange County approve.”

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Source: Individual candidates