Candidates’ differences often subtle

At the end of a recent debate, the three Republican candidates for the 5th Congressional District found themselves at a loss.

They’d just been asked what, besides their experience, distinguished them from each other.

From the occupation of Iraq to stem cell research, they had just spent an hour agreeing with one another and the Bush administration on nearly every major issue of our time.

This primary campaign season, state Sen. Larry Sheahan, state Rep. Cathy McMorris and Spokane lawyer Shaun Cross have been running on their resumes. Who has the experience to lead, and who can more readily defeat their Democratic rival?

Or as Sheahan put it: “We don’t want Nancy Pelosi and the liberal Democrats getting in the way of President Bush’s agenda.”

Ten years after upsetting House Speaker Tom Foley in Washington’s 5th Congressional District, Rep. George Nethercutt is leaving the seat open for the first time in 60 years to run for the U.S. Senate. That he was encouraged by the White House to challenge Sen. Patty Murray speaks to the confidence Republicans have in their ability to maintain control of the House seat from the state’s sprawling and conservative eastern district.

The three candidates have risen to the occasion, each of them stumping the 23,000-square-mile district from Canada to Oregon on the issues of tax cuts and smaller government.

Waiting for an opponent to emerge in September, and with nearly four times the cash on hand as his nearest Republican fund-raiser, is moderate Democrat Don Barbieri. Unopposed in the primary, the chairman of the board and former CEO of WestCoast Hospitality Corp. has the luxury of conserving his financial and political resources for the general election.

Meanwhile, the Republicans appear in forum after forum, repeating their prescriptions for health care and cures for economic malaise.

Different backgrounds

McMorris, who grew up working for her family’s Kettle Falls orchard and fruit stand and became the first in her family to graduate from college, has represented the 7th Legislative District since she was appointed to fill the seat in 1994. She was the first woman to become state House minority leader in 2002. Backed by former U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton, her base is in the northeastern Washington counties she has represented. She was recently endorsed by the Washington Farm Bureau.

“I am well grounded in free enterprise and capitalism,” she said, touting her “proven record needed right now to represent Eastern Washington.”Cross, born into a prominent Ritzville family, first pursued a career in physics and engineering, but for 25 years has been an attorney, the last six years as head of the largest law firm in the region. He insists his lack of political experience should make as little difference to voters as it did when Nethercutt or Foley were elected. He has served as chairman of Spokane’s Public Facilities District and was instrumental in securing the Spokane Convention Center expansion. If not for his decision to run for Congress, he would be president of the Spokane Area Chamber of Commerce now.

“It’s time to get an expert in business involved,” Cross said, adding that he has been endorsed by an impressive list of 500 area business leaders, including the CEOs of some of Spokane’s biggest employers.

Sheahan can claim both legislative and business experience, having represented the 9th Legislative District since 1992 and working as a partner in his family’s Rosalia law firm since 1986. He was appointed in 1999 to fill a vacancy in the state Senate, where he was elected majority floor leader last year. He also points out that he is the only one of the three candidates to have represented any part of Spokane Valley. He has been endorsed by many local politicians and the state’s most prominent law enforcement unions.

“We can’t afford on-the-job training,” Sheahan never fails to mention at each forum he attends, in an apparent dig at Cross.

In agreement

The differences between the Republicans are about emphasis, not policy, which strays little from the party line. All three favor making Bush’s tax cuts permanent and reducing regulation on business.

“I view that as one of the biggest issues in government,” said McMorris, who has made scaling down government her mantra.

“It comes down to who ultimately is the decision maker,” she recently told a gathering at the Narcisse Grange near Colville, her home turf. “So much of public policy is made outside the legislative branch, where the unelected have the authority to dictate what you do on your land.”

A favorite target of all three candidates is the Endangered Species Act, which Cross said “is being abused by extreme environmentalists” and misinterpreted by “activist” judges. Cross is a defender of the Columbia-Snake river dam system and said he would make relicensing of the Box Canyon Dam in Pend Oreille County a priority.

At the candidates’ first forum in June, sponsored by KTRW radio, Sheahan agreed with Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry that the United States should eliminate tax breaks that encourage companies to outsource jobs overseas, but he cautioned against protectionist measures.

“We don’t have enough workers trained to do a lot of jobs,” he said, while calling for investment in U.S. colleges and job training.

Cross responded that he would not go so far as tax disincentives. He cited Telect Inc. as an example of a company that had to move some jobs to Mexico in order to keep other jobs here.

“We need to be very careful about this,” Cross said. “I would not agree with John Kerry.”

The Republicans make quick work of questions about moral issues that divide the nation. All three oppose abortion, except when the life of a mother is at risk. All three support Bush’s call for a constitutional amendment outlawing same-sex marriage. They all oppose the use of fetal cells in stem cell research.

“It’s wrong to create life only to destroy it, even for a noble cause,” Sheahan said.

Tort reform

They support the president’s decision to invade Iraq. Though the resulting occupation and loss of American life troubles them, Cross said the nation has “to stay the course.”

“These people are out to destroy our way of life, and I’d rather oppose them in the Sunni Triangle than in New York, Washington or San Francisco,” he said.

When it comes to the Patriot Act, Sheahan said there are provisions “we need to look at,” and Cross said we need to be careful “we don’t let the pendulum swing too far the other way.”

“There is a balance between providing tools to fight terrorism and unintended consequences of weakened civil liberties,” McMorris said. “One of the good things about the Patriot Act are that it has to be reauthorized.”

The Republican candidates oppose nationalizing health care, which they refer to as “socialized medicine,” and call for higher Medicaid and Medicare reimbursements to health care providers.

“Health care is an individual responsibility,” said McMorris, who favors medical savings accounts, untaxed funds to be used for catastrophic health care. “Like an IRA, if you don’t spend those dollars, they are carried forward.”

As state representative, she sponsored the “Critical Access Act” that allowed rural hospitals to get reimbursements through Medicare and Medicaid.

Ask any of the three Republicans about the nation’s health care crisis, which has left an estimated 44 million Americans without insurance, and they will respond with “tort reform” to discourage patients from filing frivolous lawsuits against health care providers.

“The real problem is runaway jury verdicts” driving up the cost of medical malpractice insurance, said Cross, who supports a prevailing party rule, in which litigants who lose pay attorney fees, and caps on noneconomic damages.

Sheahan said insurance companies were driven out of the state by mandates, and that without competition there are no incentives to keep costs down. Yet he realizes that employers should provide health care, they just need tax incentives to do so. He favors reducing the time drug companies can hold a patent, giving them enough time to recoup costs while allowing less expensive generic drugs to come on the market sooner.

But “womb to tomb health care” at government expense is not the answer, Cross said.

Barbieri, able to choose his battles as the sole Democratic candidate, in June presented a comprehensive plan to make health care more accessible. Among the steps Barbieri said he would take are allowing Medicare to leverage its buying power and permitting the safe importation of drugs from Canada.

“You cannot use sound bites like tort reform as solutions,” Barbieri told a group of low-income seniors in July. He said insurance companies claim frivolous lawsuits cause malpractice premiums to rise, but premiums are just as high in states that have implemented caps.

Health concerns

At McMorris’ Grange meeting, Larry and Carol Enright talked about the issue most important to them.

“I’d like to see something when you retire after 35 years you don’t have to go back to work to make ends meet,” said Larry Enright, a retired Boise Cascade worker. He drives a truck and raises hay on his small farm to augment the couple’s income, a quarter of which goes to supplement their Medicare coverage.

“This new Medicare drug plan stinks,” said his wife, who retired from Bank of America in November. She said her pharmacist told her she was not eligible for the drug assistance.

McMorris thinks the drug plan was “a step in the right direction,” though “there is work to be done for sure.”

Carol Enright said she’s glad to hear Congress could revisit the prescription drug plan, “but it will be too damn late for us.”