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Bruin Democrats Vice President Matthew Dababneh (left) and Bruin Republicans member David Hackett

In a rare debate, Bruin Republicans and Bruin Democrats met Wednesday evening to slug it out over war, admissions and Saddam Hussein.

The debate was lead by a panel of three representatives from each side. The audience, which consisted of about 20 people split evenly along party lines, participated frequently throughout.

Although other issues – such as gun control and capital punishment – were on the agenda, debate over war and affirmative action proved so heated that the allotted hour and a half did not leave time for anything else.

“Bush should not have the power to do preemptive strikes without Congressional support or U.N. support. We should encourage the U.N. to flex its might and do what it is supposed to do,” said Kristina Meshelski, a fourth-year philosophy student and Bruin Democrats president.

Bruin Republicans voiced strong support for the war, saying U.S. intervention would greatly aid the Iraqi people.

“Their people are going to be a lot better off after a U.S. incursion. Leaving Saddam in place is not going to help the Iraqi people,” said David Hackett, a fourth-year political science and French student.

“Is it worth millions of Iraqi lives to remove Saddam?” an audience-member asked.

“Is it worth millions of Iraqi lives to leave Saddam in place?” Hackett countered.

Bruin Republicans dismissed the significance of worldwide protests, estimating that only about 5 percent of America’s population have voiced their opposition to the war.

Audience reaction was mixed. Some students agreed Iraq was an important issue but disapproved of the way Bush is approaching the problem.

“It seems the Bush administration is going to go to war no matter what Saddam does, and that is a problem,” said Sean Kolodji, a second-year political science student.

Other students flat-out disagreed with war.

“It don’t think Saddam is the most important problem in the world today. There are many other things killing more people on a daily basis than Saddam Hussein,” said audience-member Sarah Langer, a second-year political science student.

The debate over affirmative action was equally contentious. Bruin Republicans argued affirmative action is “reverse discrimination” and advocated a different means of judging applications.

“Affirmative action is the epitome of over-simplification. If there was a way to level the playing field, the best way should be to look at their social-economic position,” said Jonathan Cayton, a fourth-year history and geography student and vice chairman of the Bruin Republicans.

However, Matthew Dababneh, a fourth-year political science and public policy student and vice president of the Bruin Democrats, called affirmative action a “necessary evil” in a diverse, imperfect society.

“You have to have government programs that level the playing field because our society is diverse. It’s an argument about practicality, about how we can make our society the best it can possibly be,” he said.

Although the debate carried passionate overtones at times, good humor generally prevailed.

Andrew Jones, a political science student, chair of the Bruin Republicans and former Daily Bruin columnist, said this was the first time in his four years here he could remember the two sides engaging in a debate.

“I think it was a real positive thing. We’re not going in there tearing each other’s heads off, so I could see us doing this again in the future,” he said.

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