I met Suzan DelBene for the first time some months ago, when we talked about why she chose to run for congress. She impressed me then, and I have not been disappointed since. In the past six weeks, she’s closed a 14 point gap to within the margin of error. (More)

Joan McCarter wrote about this race at Daily Kos and Politico called it a “sleeper alert” yesterday, citing this article in the Seattle-PI. The Republicans are freaking, though, because they expected this to be a comfortable contest for David Reichert. They are putting 11th hour resources into this district to be sure.

You might remember Wa-08 prior, when Darcy Burner ran for congress in 2006 and 2008. This is a tough district that has never seated a Democrat, but is always within striking distance of making a red to blue transition. Darcy nearly succeded. More than turning a red seat blue, though, I want to tell you why we need to send Suzan to congress.

It’s not just the economy. It’s jobs.

And if we’re going to create jobs in this country, we have to create infrastructure that supports small businesses. The GOP’s Big Government Socialism vs. Apple Pie Capitalism is a false dichotomy. Their idea of apple pie empowers large corporate interests to the point where they are anti-competitive. What’s best for huge, entrenched corporations does not work for anyone else.

Suzan understands that we need regulations to protect business interests. She understands that we need infrastructure — particularly tough, long term projects such as green energy research and development — in order to make our economy strong. She knows that it’s easy to say “green economy”, but it’s harder to make it happen. She has 20 years’ experience at creating jobs and high-tech infrastructure, and she can lead the way.

My praise for Suzan is rooted in my frustration with the issues that are blocking our green energy economy, and how well she understands these problems. She really gets it. Green businesses are small businesses that create jobs. But a small business that wants to innovate has the cards stacked against it — its owners can’t get working capital. The banks won’t loan them money, and venture capital is increasingly rare. Why? Because our banking system and our research funding system is broken. Suzan understands this deeply, and is ready to lead us in fixing it.

Nobody is going to extend venture capital to a company that is dogged by costly research when the time it takes to release a product to market is longer than the life of the patent. Many greentech firms are walking dead for just this reason. The best business model is one that innovates on someone else’s research. Privatizing research kills jobs and kills small businesses just as fast as it kills science. Suzan is a scientist who first worked in biotech before she earned an MBA and moved to the business side of technology, and she understands how the government can best provide the resources we need to get back on our feet and compete in the world.

And she’s progressive.

DelBene understands how special interests are running away with our money and ruining our economy — she supports strict Wall Street reform, and wants to prevent banks from becoming “too big to fail” again, ever. She wants to hold BP accountable for every penny, and she wants to eliminate tax breaks to the wealthy few that contribute so much to our enormous national debt. The important difference with Suzan is that she knows how to get these things done.

The Seattle Times, a paper that reliably supports Republicans (recall that they launched an 11th hour smear campaign against Darcy Burner to save Reichert in 2008) supported DelBene over their usual favorite in the primary. They endorsed Suzan over Reichert again this week:

The Seattle Times endorses Democrat Suzan DelBene. The technology entrepreneur from Medina is politically untested but offers tremendous promise.

A deep and continuing financial crisis calls out for someone with sharp business and entrepreneurial skills and an acute understanding of what went wrong in the first place…

The GOP is not being casual about this tightening race. They are dumping resources into Wa-08 for an October blitz, to be sure. They started running their first TV ad on October 6th, and there is a frenzy yet to come.

If you have the means, please donate to support DelBene’s TV ads — ballots go out October 15, and airtime is critical now.

Here is her most recent ad:

This is my personal favorite:

Here is another:

If you’re in the area, you can sign up sign up to volunteer.

We really can pick up a seat. Really.