CALIFORNIA ELECTIONS / U.S. SENATE : It’s Debate No. 1: Just What Is a Debate? : Politics: The candidates may not agree on what to call their get-togethers, but Boxer and Herschensohn will participate in four forums.

The debate debate rages on.

First, U.S. Senate candidate Bruce Herschensohn challenged his opponent, Barbara Boxer, to weekly debates.

She declined, saying that a few debates would be fine, but that she planned to spend much of her time leading up to the Nov. 3 election on the campaign trail.

Then Boxer issued a press release announcing her intention to participate in four “debates and public appearances” with Herschensohn. The press release began: “Boxer Announces Four Senate Debates.”

But wait, comes the cry from the Herschensohn camp. These are not really debates. Call them forums. Call them speeches. Anything but debates.

Wrong, insists the Boxer contingent. Questions will be answered. Issues discussed. Hence, a debate.

And so the two sides debated, when is a debate a debate?

Herschensohn and Boxer, whose viewpoints on most issues are about as far apart as it gets, are competing for the six-year seat being vacated by retiring Sen. Alan Cranston.

Webster’s New World Dictionary defines the word debate as the “discussion or consideration of opposing reasons”; an “argument about or deliberation on a question,” or “a formal contest of skill in reasoned argument, with two teams taking opposite sides of a specified question.”

What Republican Herschensohn wants is the opportunity to pose questions to his opponent, and he wants rebuttal time to be included, campaign spokesman John Peschong said. A debate must include interaction.

Democrat Boxer considers the airing of positions and ideas to be a debate, a time-honored format used by presidential candidates and a host of other political aspirants, campaign spokeswoman Karen Olick said.

So what do the sponsors of these, er, events say?

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“It’s sort of a semantic interpretation,” said Daniel Bourne, congressional district coordinator for the voter outreach branch of the American Assn. of Retired Persons, which is sponsoring one of the forums Oct. 14 in Manhattan Beach.

“They’re going to be there together, so it might be a debate. But since they’re not rebutting each other, it’s not really a debate. . . .

“The Barbara Boxer group says it’s a debate, the Herschensohn group says it’s a discussion . . . (and) we’re calling it a forum where we get together to discuss the issues.”

Bourne described the planned format: Herschensohn and Boxer will appear together, give opening statements, then answer questions posed by a moderator and from the audience. Exchanges between the candidates are not anticipated, although closing time periods can be used for any kind of statement, challenge or even rebuttal, Bourne said.

“We don’t want them shouting at each other or pointing fingers,” Bourne said. “We hope we can avoid that.”

The other forums that Herschensohn and Boxer are scheduled to appear at are: Thursday in San Francisco, hosted by the Senior Action Network; Saturday in Long Beach, sponsored by the League of Women Voters; Sept. 21 in San Francisco, with Women Vote ’92 sponsoring.

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At the Thursday event, the candidates will not appear together, much less debate, said Jodie Reid, Senior Action Network director. At the other two forums, the candidates will appear jointly and answer questions in turn; the League of Women Voters session allows rebuttal time, the Women Vote’s format does not.

Boxer’s campaign believes that Herschensohn is trying to make an issue of the debates to create the false impression that Boxer, who is ahead in state polls and in fund raising, is avoiding him. A similar tactic, they noted, was employed during the primary, when Herschensohn’s staff accused his Republican opponent, Rep. Tom Campbell, of avoiding debates--even though the two squared off in more forums than candidates in any other primary race.

Indeed, Herschensohn’s campaign maintains that Boxer is hesitant to face the conservative former television commentator’s keen debate skills and doesn’t want to have to defend her liberal positions against Herschensohn’s grilling.

“It’s becoming hard not to conclude that the evasive Ms. Boxer, a native of Brooklyn . . . has become the original Brooklyn Dodger,” Herschensohn campaign manager Ken Khachigian said in a press release.

Boxer’s aides deny she’s hiding--she just completed a 58-city, 15-day statewide tour--and add that her views will be aired at the scheduled candidate forums in the formats planned.

“He’s behind in the polls, and he’s desperate to gain some momentum, and he’s using this issue to try to do that,” Olick, of the Boxer campaign, said.

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In the other U.S. Senate race on the November ballot, for the last two years of the term vacated by Gov. Pete Wilson, the candidates are appointed Sen. John Seymour, a Republican, and former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat.

Seymour and Feinstein have agreed to three forums on Oct. 3, 11 and 19.