There's do much happening in this race that I can barely keep up. Independent money is pouring in, the first post-primary independent poll came out a couple of days ago, and the Gard camp is claiming that they've blocked AFSME from running radio ads by persuading the radio stations that the ads are deceitful. Keep going for all the details.
As of 10/14 outside groups have put more than 1.4 million dollars into this race, with roughly a 55-45 ratio in favor of Gard. In the last three days alone about four hundred thousand dollars of additional money came in. I've put together a
full listing of independent expenditures on my blog. There's also a bit of analysis you might find interesting in an
older post I did on this race, although the numbers in that post are out of date.
Among all that new money is nearly fifty-thousand dollars from AFSME for radio ads to attack Gard. But on 10/13 Gard put out a press release saying that every radio station in the district had agreed to drop the ads because they contain "indefensible falsehoods." I haven't heard the ads, but it appears they state that Gard opposed providing body armor to Wisconsin National Guard troops going to Iraq. I hate to say it, but given that the State Legislature has very little to do with buying military equipment, somehow AFSME's claim doesn't pass the sniff test, even to a partisan lefty like me.
So where does the race stand? The independent poll by Constituent Dynamics (click on Wisconsin on the map) shows Kagen up by two point. A lot of left-leaning pundits have been trumpeting this poll, but it actually shows the race tightening compared to a head-to-head poll Constituent Dynamics conducted at the end of August. Back then Kagen had a four point lead, so Gard has cut that in half. All within the margin of error, of course. Kagen's internal polling from September and that from Democratic-leaning Mellman Group show Kagen with a lead in the four to eight percent range. But these polls are likely biased in favor of Kagen. Keep in mind that the 8th is a Republican majority district that went for Bush by 55 to 44 percent in '04.
So but don't believe anybody who tells you they know which way this race is going right now. It's still a tossup. Hope for the best, but if you live in the 8th CD, keep working like hell!