Election

  In a U.S. Senate debate that saw sharp disagreements among all three candidates, Republican Sen. Norm Coleman said Thursday that he wouldn't ever call his support for the war in Iraq a mistake.

Democrat Al Franken criticized Coleman several times for his initial support of the war, saying he was "astounded" that Coleman wouldn't now say it was a mistake. Franken and the Independence Party's Dean Barkley both initially supported the invasion, but now say they based that on bad information and were wrong.

Coleman stood his ground, pointing out that he's been openly critical of how the war was fought and how the reconstruction was handled.

"But what I'm not going to tell the parents of any kid who died in Iraq is that this was a mistake," Coleman said. "I just won't do that."

Coleman and Franken had a brief, intense conversation immediately after the debate, held at the University of Minnesota-Duluth before a crowd of about 1,600; Coleman said it had to do with their exchange on Iraq.

All three candidates say they want U.S. soldiers out of Iraq, but Franken and Barkley support setting a timetable for withdrawal while Coleman says the decision must be left to military leaders.

Coleman and Franken, locked in a tight race according to recent polls, also tangled on other issues: health care, taxes and energy policy. But several of the sharpest exchanges were between Coleman and Barkley, who polls have shown is registering a healthy third but with plenty of ground still to make up.

Coleman twice hit Barkley for his tenure as a top aide to Jesse Ventura when he was Minnesota's governor, pointing out that the administration left office with a $4.5 billion state budget deficit.

"I do not think the Ventura administration is the model for good governance for the state of Minnesota," Coleman said.

That prompted an angry response from Barkley, who blamed the deficit on political maneuvering by Democrats and Republicans in the state Legislature. But Coleman returned to the criticism a few minutes later, provoking an even angrier rebuttal from Barkley.

"On your watch, Norm, we had the greatest malfeasance of office in history with the economic meltdown," Barkley said. "This happened on your watch and we're all paying a price."

Franken, as well, returned numerous times to the effects of the Bush administration's rule the last eight years, and he sought to link Coleman to those policies.

"If you like the way things have been going the last six years in Washington, and you believe George Bush is right 90 percent of the time, then I'm not your guy," Franken said.

On most every topic, Coleman portrayed himself as the candidate best positioned to achieve actual results in Washington. He made several references to critics "sitting in the cheap seats" and taking easy shots at those in the trenches.

"In these challenging times, some people want to ask who should we blame," Coleman said. "I think it's better to ask who should be fixing it."

Coleman tried to draw a distinction between himself and Franken on health care, pointing out that when Franken was running for the Democratic endorsement for Senate, he signaled support for a single-payer, government-run health care plan. At the time, Franken indicated he would be open to voting for such a plan but that it wouldn't be his first choice.

Franken said he now supports Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's health care plan, which is not based on a single-payer system. "I've asked Norm Coleman whether he supports John McCain's health care plan, and he won't say yes or no either way," Franken said.

Coleman said he expects the solution to rising health care costs would likely be some combination of what's been proposed by Obama and McCain. "Again, the question is who has a record that shows they can get in there and get it done?" Coleman said.

The candidates meet for two more debates -- one a week from Friday on the public television news show "Almanac" and the final one on the weekend before the election at the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul.