The most watched and contested partisan primary race this year is probably the 43rd Legislative District Democrat fight to succeed Rep. Ed Murray. There are six candidates in the race, all offering essentially the same tried and failed far-left foolish proposals, all trying to outpander to the same far-left Democrat constituencies, and who will end up splitting the vote six ways. It seems to me there's both a need and and opportunity for someone who has a different (and more moderate and sensible) perspective to jump in by this Friday's filing deadline.

The Stranger has been covering this race better than anybody else in the local media (among other things, read Dan Savage's liveblogging of today's candidate debate before the editorial board). And Eli concluded a few weeks ago that the six candidates are "ideologically indistinguishable for the most part".

One of the candidates, Bill Sherman, stopped by my house this weekend while doorbelling my neighborhood. I give him bonus points both for having the endurance to doorbell in 90° weather and also for reaching out to someone across the ideological divide. He seemed pleasant enough and gave the impression that, if elected, he would welcome dialogue with all of his constituents (which unfortunately cannot be said for some of our other elected officials). But his policy proposals? Oy. One example -- His education platform is:

I will go to Olympia as a champion for the Seattle schools.

The other candidates don't add much ideological diversity. That's too bad. There are a lot of moderate Democrats, independents and Republicans who will be poorly represented if any of these folks are elected. It would be nice to see a moderate person throw their hat in the ring so some of these issues could be debated for a change. And with 6 "progressives" splitting the nutburger vote, there's a non-trivial chance a moderate could win the primary by attracting moderates, independents and, yes, Republicans to vote in the primary. To have any chance of winning, this person should be fiscally responsible, liberal or libertarian on social issues; and most importantly -- have enough pre-existing name recognition and access to earned media that they can generate enough of a buzz to overcome the late entry. Even if it's a longshot, it would be worth it to force a debate and make some of the six "ideologically indistinguishable" candidates separate themselves from the pack and start appealing to the moderate voters.

The filing deadline is Friday at 4pm. And you don't need to be pre-approved by the Democratic Party to run in the primary.