Former Seattle Congressman Jim McDermott, who pushed against the war in Iraq and helped develop Washington’s precursor to Obamacare, has passed away at 89. “McDermott was a great all-around liberal,” Paul Berendt, who chaired Washington’s Democratic Party from 1995 to 2006, told KUOW. “He fought for health care for all, he fought against these foreign interventions resulting in war, but he was also a major environmental advocate.”.