Ms. Torres Ray is impressive - confident and well spoken, passionate. Perhaps too focused on a narrow range of issues right now, but she makes up for that by being clearly competent to make policy choices based on the facts, not based on party loyalties, paying back favors, etc.

(And it didn't hurt that she was one of the few whose campaign literature didn't read like it was written in a Camp Wellstone workshop. Earl Netwel gets points on that, too.)

Mr. Benson comes off as an old-time tent revival evangelist, with a demonstrated commitment to back room politics.