Looking less and less GOP these days.Susan Hutchison has made refusing to

Looking less and less GOP these days.Susan Hutchison has made refusing to be labeled a Republican a central theme of her campaign. Despite numerous contributions to local and federal GOP races, Hutchison insists she’s not bound by party. To that end, she’s paraded out endorsements from state auditor Brian Sontag, Lt. Governor Brad Owen and former Seattle Mayor Wes Uhlman. None of them are exactly far left (Uhlman organized Democrats for Dino–as in Rossi), but they are members of the party. Hutchison also formally backs Referendum 71, granting gay and lesbian domestic partners the same state rights married couples have. And now she’s got another little feather in her non-partisan cap.Reporting from the Suburban Cities Association debate in Tukwila last night, seattlepi.com’s Joel Connelly notes that Hutchison came out against Tim Eyman’s latest initiative, I-1033, which would put dramatic constraints on the ability of government to expand programs or increase spending. Hutchison won several Seattle precincts in the primary and continuing to cast doubt on Dow Constantine’s push to label her the Republican candidate can only help those numbers. That’s got to rankle state Democratic Party chair Dwight Pelz who insists: “We are gonna get the message out that Dow’s the Democrat in the race and she’s the Republican in the race. It’s our responsibility to return this to a partisan race.”