Talking down to the voters like that can't have helped.
US Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat, and Republican challenger Dino Rossi are running in a dead heat for the seat in Washington state. Both candidates are drawing millions in contributions in the race, one of 10 seats the GOP targeted this year. (Ted S. Warren/Associated Press)
She looks like she has been around too many 4-year-olds; how long has she been in Washington?
"Angst, funds flood crucial Senate race; Washington state is among GOP’s targets" by Donovan Slack, Globe Staff | October 22, 2010
SEATTLE — In a small senior center in this city’s northwest corner, a banner hailing the Democratic Party hung over the bingo board Saturday morning, and volunteers flipped pancakes as a small woman in jeans and tennis shoes shook hands and walked through a crowd.
The woman, Patty Murray, a soft-spoken soccer mom turned three-term US senator, is campaigning to keep her seat against what the GOP predicts will be a Republican tidal wave in November. The senator and Democrats insist she is in position to withstand being swept under, but polls put her in a dead heat with her Republican challenger, Dino Rossi.
Related: Washington Women Weary of Murray
It is a crucial race, one of 10 that Republicans have targeted as they seek control of the Senate. White House officials say Washington state is a must-win for Democrats to keep the chamber, a point President Obama reiterated yesterday....
Republicans are opening their wallets to back Rossi: The GOP and conservative groups have poured at least $4.3 million into the race, with $1.8 million alone from American Crossroads and American Crossroads GPS, groups founded with help from top strategist Karl Rove, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Rossi raised $2 million of his own.
See: The Return of Karl Rove
Murray has her own deep pockets. An influential incumbent who chairs the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on transportation, housing, and urban development, she has raised $11.7 million, including $2.1 million from political-action committees representing business interests. And the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has tossed in $1.4 million to help her.
So she is different from all the rest how (outside the illusion of image)?
“If Murray loses, then we’re talking about a really big wave,’’ said Jennifer Duffy, senior editor of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report.
Democrats had little hesitation in bringing the beleaguered president to Washington — part of a four-state western swing — to help Murray. His approval rating of 52 percent here is several points above the national average, according to Gallup. About 3,000 people were turned away from the rally of 10,000 and watched the proceedings in a damp rain in an outdoor area....
I would have went home.
Sit in the rain to listen to that lying clown?
Murray, who holds only a one-point lead in a McClatchy poll released Wednesday, has several factors in her favor.
And ONE BIG ONE AGAINST HER!
Analysts say the Tea Party movement and antigovernment sentiment have not taken root here as they have in other parts of the country.
In addition, Murray’s unassuming, folksy demeanor plays well with voters. One analyst describes her as “way more Clintonian’’ than her opponent.
“She is better at connecting in a crowd or one on one,’’ said Todd Donovan, political science professor at Western Washington University....
But Murray has taken some hits to her frugal, maternal image. She supported one of the most notorious earmarks of recent times in 2005, a proposal to spend $223 million on the “bridge to nowhere’’ in Alaska that would have connected an island with 50 residents and an airport to Ketchikan. And the Seattle Times reported last month that Murray inserted $19 million worth of earmarks into a recent defense-appropriations bill, benefiting clients of 17 former aides who had become lobbyists.
The SOCCER MOM NO MORE!
Now she is JUST LIKE ALL the OTHER SCUM!
Murray is unapologetic, saying earmarks are important investments in the future of her region and America as a whole.
Are they just IMMERSED in ARROGANCE when they get down there?
Is that why they come back this way after soooo long?
“I am who I am,’’ she said in an interview after the pancake breakfast. “I’m a tough mom, I am a former preschool teacher, I know how to deal with 4-year-olds, and I go to bat for the people I represent.’’
Rossi, 51, is a numbers guy, a fiscal conservative and former state senator who balanced the state budget and is railing against big-spending Democrats in Washington. He is a commercial real estate executive who has twice mounted unsuccessful bids for governor, including one in 2004 that he lost by 133 votes, the closest gubernatorial contest in US history.
Nearly always dressed in an impeccably pressed suit and tie, he can come off at times as a policy wonk, analysts say. But he can also be engaging one on one, and he has a take-charge demeanor that has resonated with voters....
At a Gilded Age hotel in the center of Spokane, a onetime fur-trading post, Rossi sat with a dozen or so veterans last Friday. In a small meeting room with crystal chandeliers and silver pitchers of water on the table, the veterans talked about limited job prospects for soldiers returning from Iraq and perceptions that providing health care for life to anyone who signs up for military service could end up on the chopping block....
After the meeting, Rossi said in an interview that he’s gravely concerned about Democratic spending in Washington. He lamented passage of the stimulus bill, corporate bailouts, and the health care bill, which he said will “bankrupt America.’’ And he zeroed in on Murray’s support of those measures.
“Now she’s running around the state saying she’s worried about what we’re leaving to our kids and our grandkids; well, that ship sailed,’’ he said. “And she’s voted for every one of these spending bills.’’
Rossi pointed to his own fiscal record. He spent six years as a state senator, from 1997 to 2003, and as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, closed a $2.8 billion budget gap without raising taxes.
“The secret to my success in the state Senate, which I’m going to bring to the US Senate, is that I never really cared if I got reelected,’’ he said. “I was happy before I got into politics. I figure I’ll be happy after.’’
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I think Patty will be looking the same on election night.
