McMorris, Barbieri spar in TV debate

Fifth Congressional District candidates disagreed about the outsourcing of jobs and how to fix the health care crisis, but what really got the debate going between Don Barbieri and Cathy McMorris on Friday was experience.

“I bring 35 years of business experience and creating jobs,” the Democrat said, “and my opponent has spent 11 years as a career politician.”

Not that there’s anything wrong with that, he added later.

“I have been intimately involved in every business issue before the state Legislature,” McMorris responded, adding that her fellow Republicans thought enough of her to elect her House minority leader last year.

So their second debate of the campaign was more about who they are than where they stand on the issues, and, of course, there was another exchange about negative campaign ads.

“I am proud of the fact we have run a very positive campaign,” McMorris said. She said she had nothing to do with the National Republican Congressional Campaign ad that linked Barbieri’s late father to a transit center deal that fell through in the early 1990s.

But pressed on the issue by one of the three journalists questioning them in the KSPS studio, McMorris said she wasn’t at all sure the numbers used by the NRCC were all that incorrect. This prompted Barbieri to scold her for not taking a tougher stand with her party on the issue of negative ads.

Then McMorris had the opportunity to denounce a Barbieri ad criticizing her vote in the Legislature on the outsourcing of jobs going overseas. She said she opposes outsourcing jobs but there were “too many unkowns” about what impact the bill she voted against last session would have had on trade.

The debate also touched on issues that more clearly define them as candidates.

“I agree that marriage should be defined as between a man and a woman,” Barbieri said, but said the church and state should do the defining.

McMorris supports a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

“I have proven in Olympia that we can balance the budget without raising taxes,” McMorris said.

Barbieri said he’s been balancing his company’s budget for years. He has also been in the top 2 percent tax bracket and while he supports a middle-class tax break, his bracket doesn’t need a break.

On health care, the Democrat laid out a plan to pool the resources of small businesses and give them a tax credit to provide health insurance to employees. He also called for early enrollment in Medicare on a premium basis.

“I do not believe a government-run system is the answer,” said McMorris, who called for health savings accounts.

McMorris supported President Bush’s restrictions on stem-cell research.

“We need to give science the best chance” to cure Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease, Babrieri said.

Both defend Second Amendment rights to gun ownership, but Barbieri believes waiting periods are a balanced approach to making sure communities are safe.

McMorris said she would focus on increasing penalties for crimes committed with firearms.