After the Washington State Democratic party unleashed a barrage of e-mail and website attacks trying to scare potential GOP challenger Dino Rossi from getting into the Senate race, Rossi has started pushing back.
In an interview with the Seattle Post Intelligencer, Rossi avoided personally attacking Sen. Patty Murray (D), but questioned her tactics. “She could stop this with one phone call. After 18 years, is this all she has to run on?” he asked.
The this he is referring to is a series of e-mails and a website designed by the Democratic party attacking Rossi for, in their words, “committing assault on Washington’s families.”
But Rossi insisted that he isn’t interested in the politics of personal destruction. “I have nothing personally against Patty Murray: She has hired great staff people who have done great work across the state. But the country is in trouble — serious trouble,” said Rossi who has run for governor twice.
Rossi went on to compare his opponent’s media attacks to adolescent bullying:
I told [my son], ‘Joe, they’re going to be telling lies about me exactly the way Christine Gregoire did in 2004 and 2008.’ He came back at me and said, ‘It’s just like junior high school’.
If Rossi decides to run, he may have the advantage. The TPM Poll Average shows Rossi leading Murray 50% to 43.8% in a prospective general election. However, Rossi has said he is still “working some things through with the family” and looking into the “feasibility of whether this can be done.”
