Debate

While the rest of the country was focused upon the McCain-Obama debate, Washington voters were mildly interested in the borefest that was the Dino Rossi v Christine Gregoire, hosted by Jean "Yes I still work here" Enersen and some other KING-5 lackey who's name has since drifted to the winds of history.

Full coverage of the debate is available at the king5.com website, but of special importance to Sonic fans is what the candidates had to say about arena funding, other than the usual platitudes about "community" and "part of our area" and "fathers and sons" and all that other crap which signifies nothing.

If you turn to part 6 of the debate, you'll see a five minute discussion between Rossi and Gregoire, wherein you learn that Rossi 1) supports funding the improvement to KeyArena along the lines of the plan proposed by Steve Ballmer and Co. and, 2) voted against a similar plan for the Seahawks new stadium while he was a Washington legislator.

No points for Dino there.

Gregoire, finger raised prominently in the wind, certainly had her talking points ready, including the now-obligatory, "We were all lied to by the buyers from Oklahoma," leading to the conclusion that the Governor is confident that the Oklahoma-loving contingent in Washington is not signficant enough to derail her candidacy.

That's not to say that either one of the two were without controversial statements, though. After some back and forth comments from the pair about who was more to blame for the Sonics' departure, we hear this from the Governor:

"Any improvements [to KeyArena] for an NBA team must be done by the purchaser [of the team], not by the city, not by the county, and not by tourists."

Granted, those are calculated words. On the surface, a voter may think Ms. Gregoire is stating that the state will not providing any funding for a KeyArena upgrade if it's for an NBA team. However, what she is really saying is that any improvements to the arena which are solely for the benefit of an NBA team must be incurred by said team.

Considering that Steve Ballmer's proposal included $150 million in private funding, the Governor's stance still doesn't change anything vis a vis the Arena upgrade.

In other words, both candidates have planted their feet firmly in the middle, and nothing has changed.