We have alreday  published 31 “No-Brainer” endorsements for the November 2 election. We realized, though, that before we study up and make the rest of our endorsements, there's one more obvious pick.




You'd have to be ignorant of the the times not to be anxious, angry, or depressed about the economy. But those heightened emotions shouldn't cloud your judgment and push you into a rash anti-incumbent vote. Especially when that would mean voting for Republican Dino Rossi and against Washington state's talented senior  Sen. Patty Murray.

The relevant question this election is a measured one: During these depressed times, what policies will right the wrecked economy and fix its accompanying woes, including insufficient health care, inadequate public services, and a disappearing middle class?

Rossi, who has run and lost twice now for governor, speaks in boilerplate Republican patter about all these issues and acts put-upon when pressed for details.

Asked by reporters to address one of his main campaign pledges, repealing Wall Street reform, Rossi never states his objections to any of the reform measures or why they should be repealed. ("Wall Street reform" is the important legislation that helps prevent commercial banks from speculating on the stock market; dictates how much money investment banks can invest in exotic financial instruments; creates a consumer protection czar to oversee the financial industry; and regulates the derivatives market. It's unclear which elements of this legislation Rossi opposes.)

He simply ridicules Murray's record with sound bites that typically end in 'no' (the GOP's favorite word).

It's a familiar Rossi ploy. He says the Democrats shouldn't have invested $30 billion in small business loans; shouldn't have extended emergency unemployment insurance; shouldn't stop health care companies from denying coverage because of pre-existing conditions or guarantee coverage for the 32 million Americans who are currently uninsured; shouldn't demand that gays can serve openly in the military; shouldn't develop a path to citizenship for undocumented workers; shouldn't put a cap on carbon emissions; and shouldn't repeal Bush's tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans (a position that contradicts his vow to fix the budget)—all things Murray supports.

"No" is an easy position, and it makes good campaign fodder for an angry electorate, but it's not a sustainable policy position.

Rossi did get specific with PubliCola on one issue. At the beginning of the campaign season, we pressed him to tell us where he is on reproductive rights---an issue he skirted during his two runs for governor.

Presented with a list of bills Sen. Murray supported---including proposals to make Plan B available over the counter, fund family planning in developing countries, support medically accurate sex education, and support abortion rights---Rossi told us he would have voted 'no.'

Most troubling of all, though, was another one of those question Rossi couldn't answer.  When we asked him repeatedly to name one issue on which he differed with the GOP leadership this year, Rossi couldn't name a single one. That's startling because the current Republican platform reads like a replay of the deregulatory, tax-slashing, deficit-inducing policies of George Bush that crashed the economy. And it confirms that Rossi is nothing more than a pour-and-stir Republican trying to capitalize on this year's backlash.

This isn't surprising. His record as a state senator in the early 2000s was highly partisan. He voted with big business 100 percent of the time (which contradicst his rearview mirror antagonism to the Wall Street bailouts) and voted consistently against environmental, labor, and civil rights legislation.

That lack of creativity and independence is a lousy fit for Washington State, where our tradition of political independence (and our tech sector ingenuity) demands creative thinking, not scripting by Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY).

Sen. Murray, for her part, has been accused of being in lockstep with the Democrats. However, she does break with President Obama on a fundamental: The war in Afghanistan. Sen. Murray was one of just 18 senators who voted in May to demand an Afghanistan exit plan from President Obama.

Another issue on which Murray disagrees with Obama (and Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid), stressing waste cleanup and jobs at Washington State's Hanford Nuclear Reservation, is whether to close Yucca Mountain, a nuclear waste dump in Nevada (Murray wants to keep it open).

That brings us to what's great about Sen. Murray: She prioritizes this Washington while serving in that Washington, scoring millions for local highway and road projects, defense projects, veterans spending, law enforcement programs, and health care programs. (Here's a list of $220 million in state must-haves she secured in the most recent budget, putting her in the top 10 when it comes to securing funding for her home state).

Murray is on the powerful appropriations committee and chairs the transportation appropriations committee; in the last year, she brought home $1.4 million for Puyallup bus rapid transit, $2.5 million for Sound Transit light-rail trains; $1.2 million for hybrid buses in Spokane, $1.3 million for buses in Pierce County, and $600,000 for RapidRide service to West Seattle). It would be regional suicide to lose Murray at a moment when Puget Sound's future is predicated on expanding light rail.

Murray’s other gets for the state include everything from money for YWCA domestic violence programs in Yakima to infrastructure fixes at McChord Air force Base to law enforcement dollars directed at fighting meth in Tacoma.

Rossi has tried to use Murray’s talent for getting local projects into the budget as a gripe against her this election, citing it as evidence of her spendthrift ways. (Fact check: Earmarks make up less than one percent of the federal budget.) Moreover, the criticism that her line items for defense, cops, and social services add to the deficit doesn’t make sense because getting something in the budget requires knocking something else out. We’re glad Murray has Washington’s back.

In perhaps the defining moment of the campaign for us, Rossi, who bashes the kinds of investments in infrastructure and industry (the Obama stimulus package in particular) on which Murray leads, was on the campaign trail on Whidbey Island trying to align himself with small business. There he was at the Nichols Brother Boat Builders, a maritime manufacturing company. As it turns out (and as PubliCola first reported), Nichols Brothers got $800,000 in stimulus money, which helped them add 100 local jobs. The money came thanks to Sen. Murray, who as chair of the appropriations committee that oversees maritime spending directed the Obama administration to allocate $98 million to maritime industry projects like the shipyard work at the Nichols Brothers boatyard.

PubliCola likes Murray for a lot of reasons—her leadership on women's issues, in particular, stands out in her liberal voting record. But it's her commitment to Washington state's infrastructure and economy that makes her a PubliCola No Brainer in 2010.