McCarthy, Wilson Exchange Shots as Race Heats Up : Lt. Gov. Focuses on Environment, Workers’ Issues

SAN FRANCISCO — Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy, heading into the final two weeks of his underdog campaign for the U.S. Senate, portrayed himself Monday as a candidate of the working people and a protector of the environment.

In a major speech before the Commonwealth Club, McCarthy talked of his childhood as an immigrant in San Francisco and outlined a campaign agenda of government activism designed to appeal to young families and senior citizens alike.

“We need a senator who will stand up for the things that really matter to people--new jobs in new industries, excellence in education, clean water, health care for senior citizens and child-care opportunities for all working people,” he told the public affairs organization.

‘Puny Performance’

The Democratic candidate who has struggled all year to overtake Republican Sen. Pete Wilson also attacked what he described as a “puny performance” by Wilson in his one term in the Senate.

McCarthy’s wide-ranging speech before a hometown audience was an attempt to take the initiative in the final stretch of the campaign. With the World Series and the Summer Olympics over, McCarthy’s strategists believe that voters will begin focusing on the Senate contest.

Although McCarthy is trailing far behind Wilson in fund raising, his campaign has tried to save its resources so it can match Wilson’s presence on television in the final two weeks of the race. At the same time, McCarthy will step up the number of his public appearances in the hope of capturing free media attention every day.

McCarthy, who rarely mentions his personal background while campaigning, talked in Monday’s speech of coming to the United States as a child from his native New Zealand and of playing in the streets of the Mission District in San Francisco.

His strict upbringing instilled in him “a sense of family, a sense of hope for the future and a firm belief that each of us should not just take from society, but strive to give something back,” he said.

The goals of his Senate campaign, McCarthy said, are the same kind of priorities he has pursued throughout his career as an assemblyman, Speaker of the Assembly and lieutenant governor: strengthening standards for public education, improving nursing home care for the elderly, toughening laws against drug dealing and sexual battery, controlling the disposal of hazardous materials and protecting the California coast from overdevelopment.

“I will be a senator for the men and women who go to work every day, who struggle to send kids to school and save money for a down payment on a home, and who in return ask only that the water that comes out of their tap be clean enough to drink, that their streets are safe and that their parents can live out their lives in decency,” he said.

Record Attacked

In a detailed attack on the record of his Republican opponent, McCarthy charged that in six years Wilson had sponsored only one bill of major importance. Instead of addressing major problems, he said, Wilson sponsored resolutions such as the one that declared “Dairy Goat Awareness Week.”

At the same time, McCarthy said, Wilson cast pivotal votes to reduce Social Security and other social programs, to allow the production of nerve gas and to expand research on the “Star Wars” space-based defense system.

The Wilson camp countered, however, that the Republican senator has been highly effective in his first term and has won praise even from some of his Democratic colleagues.

George Gorton, a spokesman for the Wilson campaign, said the senator has sponsored many important bills, including legislation that banned the sale of drug paraphernalia through the mail and a measure that required the military to tighten security over its munitions supplies.

“Pete Wilson is one of the most effective senators in the U.S. Senate with a 75% success rate for his 56 major pieces of legislation,” Gorton said in a telephone interview.

McCarthy said as a senator he would favor using the power of the federal government to expand child-care facilities. As an opponent of offshore oil drilling, he said he would seek to cut down on the need for oil production by requiring greater fuel efficiency in automobiles. And he said he would favor eliminating the federal subsidy of tobacco growers and reducing agricultural subsidies to other large farmers.

“Our goal in everything we do must be to place economic security and independence within the reach of every family in California,” McCarthy said.