Maria Cantwell: "Game Changer" in Politics?

HuffPo:

Changed the game by ... showing some spine in the Senate. Cantwell has been one of the few Democratic senators willing to criticize the White House for its management of the economy, even calling the administration out for ignoring the input of women. A staunch environmentalist and progressive, she teamed up with John McCain to get the word out about the need to separate commercial and investment banking, and doubled down on her commitment to regulate the derivatives market. When the Senate first presented a weak bill that didn't create a one-stop clearinghouse for Wall Street's most opaque market, she voted against the legislation, a gambit that worried Democrats and delighted centrists. But she stood her ground and, in the House-Senate conference that hammered out the bill, a provision was added that forced derivatives into an open market. Her success offers a roadmap for how to function in America's most dysfunctional legislative body.

Fun fact: Cantwell got her start in politics working for a pre-TV Jerry Springer’s 1982 campaign for governor of Ohio.