Here's a belated update on some news related to the WA-3 race from last week:

• Jaime Herrera announced the endorsements of former Rep. Linda Smith and the Cowlitz County GOP.  Smith, readers will recall, was the last Republican to hold the third district; she lost a Senate bid against then first-termer Patty Murray back in 1998.  The Cowlitz County GOP endorsed Herrera unanimously; readers will remember that back in February, Herrera won a Cowlitz County GOP straw poll.

• David Castillo's campaign seems to have committed something of an own goal in the wake of the health care vote last weekend.  On Tuesday night, his campaign sent out a statement titled "Heck Takes Position on Health Care Bill-- After the Vote."  The problem?  Heck's website indicates that on March 20-- i.e., the day before the House voted on health care-- Heck announced that "at this time, if I were a member of Congress, I would be voting YES on this legislation."  Is the Castillo campaign arguing that Heck backdated that item?  Or did they just not notice it?  Or were they aware, but decided to issue an attention-grabbing attack release anyway?  Sources inside the district say that Castillo almost certainly would have known of Heck's positioning ahead of the vote.  Reportedly, Heck had been touting his support for the bill at events in the district for several days before the actual vote.  Furthermore, one Washingtonian who keeps tabs on Heck for professional reasons that I spoke to indicated receipt of a Google alert pointing to the Heck website item on Saturday night.  And, one Republican who attended a Lincoln Day dinner the night before the vote at which Castillo was reportedly present says that Heck's endorsement of the bill was mentioned during a speech there. [intro]

From the Seattle P-I writing about a fundraising letter from Denny Heck's campaign managers:

Following the example of Sarah Palin and Glen (sic) Beck, Jaime Herrera and David Castillo are reaching out and embracing the Tea Party movement that . . . shut down countless public town halls last year by yelling and harassing people.

Sarah Palin?  Glenn Beck?  Um, having interviewed both Castillo and Herrera, I'd be inclined to say they're more like Eric Cantor and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (perhaps unsurprisingly in Herrera's case).  But hey... [intro]

... the David Castillo campaign has added a Denny Heck/Health Care Watch counter to their site.

Fun! [intro]