Though only 30 minutes long, CBS4's congressional debate between candidates Mario Diaz-Balart and Joe Garcia -- broadcast on Wednesday night -- touched on a wide range of topics, including the federal bailout package, healthcare and Cuba.

What the candidates didn't do was lose their tempers. The discussion remained civil, though both candidates at times criticized their opponent.

Democratic challenger Garcia said incumbent Diaz-Balart ''has achieved very little'' during his six years in Congress. Diaz-Balart, meanwhile, questioned whether his opponent was fully answering the moderator's questions.

''He speaks very well, but he didn't propose anything,'' Diaz-Balart said during discussion of tax cuts and the economy. The debate was held and recorded Friday evening.

As he has done before, Garcia criticized Diaz-Balart for voting against the recently approved federal bailout package. ''You've got to do something,'' Garcia said, explaining why he would have supported the bailout bill. ``We're looking at some very scary times.''

Garcia's pointed criticism of Diaz-Balart's track record on the economy didn't stop there. Garcia called his rival a full supporter of President Bush's ``failed economic policies.''

''My opponent was right there with the president,'' Garcia said. ``Then when it got hot in the kitchen, he walked away, cleaned his hands of it, and talked about what he would have done, not what he did do.''

VOTES ON BAILOUT

Diaz-Balart explained his two ''no'' votes on the bailout by saying the proposal lacked adequate accountability and oversight, and amounted to a ''blank check'' for Wall Street. The second, approved version of the bill did include greater protections for taxpayers -- enough to make some lawmakers switch from opposition to support -- but Diaz-Balart said he had wanted additional changes and voted no when they didn't happen.

Of Garcia, Diaz-Balart said, 'His answer seems to be, `Hey this is great, let's just take money from the taxpayers and send it to Wall Street.' ''

Diaz-Balart also said he has been unafraid to vote against the president, and has done so dozens of times in the past two years.

On the issue of healthcare, both candidates echoed the plans of their party's presidential nominee -- Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain.

Like Obama, Garcia said the goal should be medical insurance coverage for all Americans. Diaz-Balart, meanwhile, said healthcare should be made more accessible, but not through a plan that puts coverage in the hands of ``federal bureaucrats.''

Instead of expanding government's role, Diaz-Balart said he preferred tools such as individual tax credits and allowing insurers to compete across state lines.

TRAVEL TO CUBA

Regarding restricting travel to Cuba, Diaz-Balart reiterated his support of the current once-every-three-years limit on exile travel to the island. Diaz-Balart noted that Cubans, once in the United States, are given a quicker path to citizenship than other immigrants.

''With every privilege comes responsibility,'' Diaz-Balart said. ``If you're a Colombian and you receive political asylum here, you can't go back and just travel at will back to Colombia.''

Garcia, however, called the travel rules ''an absurdity'' and ''un-American.'' He told the story of one exile who had to choose between visiting a dying mother or being able to return for the funeral after she passed.

''It's not right, and we shouldn't do that,'' he said.

On other foreign policy matters, Garcia distanced himself from Obama's willingness to hold presidential-level meetings with foreign leaders such as Raúl Castro.

''What I think he said, and I think he's pretty clear, is that if it promotes democracy and change in those countries, then he's willing to do it, and those are very important steps,'' Garcia said, adding: ``My policy has always been that we shouldn't meet with those dictatorships.''

Diaz-Balart also said he frowned on such meetings, describing Castro and Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez as ``terrorist thugs.''

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