Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi will air TV commercials tonight specially produced to appeal to viewers of Democrat Barack Obama’s acceptance of his party’s presidential nomination. In the 30 second spot, which will run only tonight, Rossi says:

Tonight the Democrats have a nominee.

I agree with him on this: Change is needed, but not just in Washington, D.C.

Change may be the only thing the Democratic presidential candidate and the Republican gubernatorial candidate agree on. But Rossi’s been trying hard to ride the change wave in his campaign against Gov. Chris Gregoire. “Change” dwarfs the candidate’s name at dinorossi.com. http://www.dinorossi.com/

Rossi doesn’t mention John McCain, his party’s presidential candidate in his stump speech. But more and more he talks about Obama. Last week, as votes were being counted in the primary election, Rossi told TVW that he wasn’t worried about a Democratic wave sweeping him aside this year.

We don’t really believe that if they do vote for Barack Obama it is an automatic vote for Christine Gregoire because if they are looking for change, why would they vote for someone who has been in state government 40 years? … You know, one of my bigger finance folks from the campaign who has actually raised a lot of money for me is an Obama supporter. We’re going to probably have tens of thousands of people who will vote for Obama and vote for us.

This doesn't mean that Rossi backs Obama. He just told me he supports Republican candidate John McCain. And while Rossi said McCain would also bring change, that hasn't come up in the campaign so far.

Democrats of course are also trying to do everything they can to ride the Obama wave. Here’s an odd, little video from Peter Goldmark, the Democrat running for lands commissioner.

I’m not exactly sure who these cartoon characters are supposed to be, with their, “So dude, who you votin’ for this election” and reference to “Frisbee Friday.” But they’re there to remind people to not just vote for Obama come November.

I wrote earlier about Gregoire’s worries about the same thing. The governor has also mailed flyers featuring big photos of Obama.