HOT SPRINGS -- In a debate today among the candidates for U.S. Senate from Virginia, the war in Iraq came up only after a question from the audience.

But former Govs. Mark R. Warner and Jim Gilmore did touch on a few topics confronting the next Senate.

Gilmore said he would favor Supreme Court nominees in the conservative mold of Justices Scalia, Roberts, Alito and Thomas. Warner said he would not look for "a simple litmus test" but would consider the proposed nominees' whole record.

Gilmore said he would not favor climate-control measures unless countries such as China and India are subject to the same controls. Warner said the United States must take the leadership role in climate control.

The candidates debated before the annual summer meeting of the Virginia Bar Association at The Homestead hotel here. They are vying for the seat John W. Warner will vacate when he retires.

Warner called Gilmore a soundbite politician who left the state in a fiscal mess that he had to clean up.

Gilmore called Warner an untrustworthy politician who will go to Washington and follow traditional Democratic policies.

"Who do you trust?" asked Gilmore.

Who gained the state recognition as the best managed state in the nation? asked Mark Warner, who is no relation to John Warner.

Virginia Tech political commentator Robert Denton described the hourlong debate as "very lively."

Warner, a Democrat, and Gilmore, a Republican, each accused the other of mischaracterizing his positions.

The debate began awkwardly.

Gilmore did not immediately appear when he was introduced.

Campaign aides explained that the audio being piped from the meeting room into the adjacent campaign room did not work.

Gilmore did not want to go without audio while the Warner campaign room was getting it, aide M. Boyd Marcus Jr. said.

After a 15-minute wait, the audio was restored.

Campaigns use audio for soundbites and to try to pick out inconsistencies in their opponent's statements.

Read tomorrow's Times-Dispatch for more from the debate.

-- Tyler Whitley