Why did Kathleen Falk win the Democratic primary for Wisconsin Attorney General? Incumbent Peg Lautenschlager had pretty overwhelming support from Democratic activists throughout the state, yet Kathleen pulled off a solid victory. The conventional wisdom was that the race would be won or lost in Milwaukee. But was it?
Unfortunately I couldn't find the analysis I wanted in the MSM, so I decided to do my own. And I started by making a county-by-county map of the results. See the rather interesting results on the flip.
Now we can see what really happened. Red is Falk, blue is Lautenschlager. The intensity of the color shows how strongly each county went for one of the candidates.
That wide red bar going diagonally across the middle of the state is why Falk won. But why is the bar there? That should all be solid Lautenschlager turf.
The answer is TV. Falk ran lots of ads in the Wausau/Rhinelander and the La Crosse/Eau Claire media markets, including a pretty nasty attack ad. And Lautenschlager simply didn't have the funds to respond. The red bar on the map matches those two media markets exactly.
So the outcome of this race was determined by money, pure and simple.
More on my blog:
http://reform-dem.blogspot.com