Attorney General Rob McKenna is in St. Paul for the Republican National Convention. According to Bryan Bissell at politickerwa, McKenna told delegates that for gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi to win this November, John McCain and Sarah Palin need to win big.

Finally McKenna talked about the coattail effects of the McCain-Palin ticket, and suggested it had a crucial relationship to gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi's chances.

"If he carries it, Dino wins," McKenna said of McCain, and urged the delegates to work hard to at least keep the presidential vote close. "If he fails to carry it by ten or twelve points, Dino doesn't win."

That’s a tall order for a Republican presidential candidate in the Everblue State. When I traveled around the state earlier this year I heard Republicans say that Rossi would have some sort of reverse coattails that would help McCain do better in Washington.

Update: McKenna's campaign spokesman Adam Faber says that McKenna's point was that McCain needs to end up within 10 points of Obama here in order for Rossi to win. And, he said the 2004 election shows that a "Republican gubernatorial candidate can run far ahead of the presidential candidate in this state. Bush lost Washington by 7.2 points that year while Rossi and Gregoire were in an absolute dead heat."