Gregoire v. Rossi

[mattp]

Serious question: other than Democrat vs Republican, what really is the governor election all about?

 

From the candidates, all I've really heard is "we can build our way out of gridlock" and "I've cured crime" and "she is a tax and spend liberal" and "we've made great progress over the last four years." Dino is clearly much more of a social conservative and Christine Gregoire has as far as I can tell been an unexciting governor.

 

Because they decline to talk much about the issues, the whole thing has been quite a bore, which is rather sad in view of the fact that it actually matters who is governor.

 

[olyclimber]

Dino is the candidate of CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN.

 

Gregoire is responsible for climate change, which is happening under her watch.

[tvashtarkatena]

Rossi looks like the kind father you never had, and Gregoire looks like she's just pulled her canines from your jugular.

[tvashtarkatena]

All seriousness aside, Rossi is a bait-and-switch candidate. He's not upfront on much of anything, and he's very misleading. Take stem cell research. According to his ads, he's 'for stem cell research' (and Gregoire's a "liar" for saying he's not), just not EMBRYONIC stem cell research. Gregoire's ads clearly state that he's against embryonic stem cell research, which is absolutely accurate. Nevermind that embryonic stem cell research is virtually the only kind that exists today, because the ability to create stem cells without embryos was just announced a couple of months ago for the first time and is a process that will no doubt be in its infancy for years to come.

[mattp]

I agree about the bait and switch thing, Tvash, but I think your argument about the stem cell research is a bit one sided. Although the technology is new and perhaps not yet proven useful, there is now a discretion between ALL stem cell research and EMBRYONIC stem cell research. He's splitting hairs, perhaps, but on the other hand the Gregoire people are using a broad brush to try to put him in a box that doesn't exactly fit. Either way, though, I read the papers at least every other day, listen to NPR regularly, and watch TV news several times a week but I have not seen much real meat in this campaign.

 

Rossi IS a social conservative and he is running on the same old Republican platform we've come to loath. Meanwhile, Gregoire is not any stark raving liberal but she certainly seems to adhere to the straight democratic playbook as far as I can tell. Both are rather dull and we don't hear much about the issues; all of the TV adds I've seen, and the bits of the debate I heard, were very uninformative. In the newspaper I've learned even less.