Gubernatorial foes talk taxes, budget in AWB debate

BLAINE - The Association of Washington Business hosted the second gubernatorial debate of the season tonight. Gov. Chris Gregoire and challenger Dino Rossi took questions submitted by members of the AWB in an hour-long format that allowed for two minute responses and no rebuttals.

As Gregoire mentioned in her closing statement, the format made for a lot of one-sided dialogue and issue soundbytes, and was nowhere near as testy as the KOMO debate of last Saturday.

Tonight's debate, which will be aired on TVW this Sunday, and nationally on CSPAN at a later date, happened in solid Rossi territory. The crowd gave him numerous rounds of applause throughout the debate, and the group had given him an award for his career as a legislator earlier in the day.

Still, the two appeared sharp on the issues, and gave substantive, if oppositional answers to questions ranging from taxes and the budget to transportation, health care and the state of politics.

In his opening statement Rossi cited the recent rise in the unemployment rate and warned, "you and I have a bullseye on our backs," in predicting that taxes would be raised in order to close the projected budget deficit.

He also went after Gregoire by calling for her to stop blaming Washington, D.C. for the state's economic woes and said that her best friends were those in state government, and not the people of Washington.

Gregoire responded by citing the Forbes and Fortune rankings for Washington's business climate, and touted her record of bringing together Republicans and private business interests to accomplish things on transportation, education and the budget. The incumbent also declared that was "tough enough" to make the decisions that would enforce the state's values in the daunting economic climate.

When it came time for the candidates to ask each other questions, Gregoire kept up with her campaign's theme of comparing Rossi to President Bush, and asked him for the three most important differences between him and Bush.

Rossi tried to turn the question back at Gregoire by saying he would have vetoed excessive spending, but then turned to mocking her for bringing up Bush when he wasn't the one running for governor.

During Rossi's turn, he asked if Gregoire would, knowing what she knows now, call for the same spending she had done during her term as governor. Gregoire snapped back that she would actually try to answer Rossi's question, then defended what she called investments in things like education, community safety and health care that she said were in fact better for Washington's economy  and families in the long run.

Otherwise each side made he said-she said claims about budgets, taxes and transportation plans, as they had last time. Both candidates, however, clearly declared that they would not raise taxes, and stood by the idea of using the priorities of government model to balance the budget.

Perhaps the most groundbreaking disagreement of the debate came when one of the questioners asked about the candidates' stance on the minimum wage. Rossi, who had earlier solidified his small business support by calling the sales tax holiday a "gimmick" and angling for long term tax cuts instead, said that he would be open to a lower minimum wage that wasn't tied to inflation, especially for younger workers.  But Gregoire reiterated her support for the minimum wage, arguing that too many people had families to support on a wage that was not making anyone rich.  

In her closing statement, Gregoire stood by her notion of representing Washington's "values" and implied that she was in the best position to lead Washington through a climate she called one of the worst since the Great Depression.

Rossi, on the other hand, acknowledged that most of those in the audience already had his cell phone number and suggested they give him a call if they had anything he needs to work on for the campaign. But mostly he made his usual plea, that his campaign was not about him, her or 2004, but instead all about fixing the projected deficit and changing the culture in Olympia.

In other words, it was what they had both said before. The two will debate again on October 1 in Yakima.