I haven’t talked to a single person in the last week outside of the Topinka campaign who believes Judy Baar Topinka can win the governor’s race. Gov. Blagojevich’s boffo fundraising report has only reinforced that notion this week.

Charlie Johnston begs to differ. Johnston, a smart Republican political operator and a friend, writes at Illinoize that he is “a bit astonished”that the “Topinka can’t win” attitude has taken hold among pundits and bloggers.

Charlie begins by recounting the governor’s extremely early and very expensive TV ad campaign and goes from there.

What was really striking about that period was that Blagojevich could not coax his own numbers above 50%. What was also striking about it was that with several million dollars of effort, he only managed to push Topinka into the mid 30s, instead of annihilating her. For six weeks of sustained effort and millions of dollars spent, Blagojevich barely got the equivalent of a field goal - and that’s not a sign of strength.

In a one-on-one race, I am not a believer in early television. It is hugely expensive and produces results that are deceptive because they are transient and shallow. In a primary in Illinois, people don’t start paying serious attention until after New Year. In a general election they don’t start paying serious attention until after Labor Day. Horse-race numbers at that point start to mean something.

In a race where the incumbent has a huge war chest that dwarfs the challenger, one of the best tactics for the challenger is to horde their own money until after Labor Day while making every effort to goad the incumbent into spending as much of his own money before then as possible. Hmmm…that’s what Topinka has done thus far. Maybe it was an accident - or maybe it is sound strategy.

He also makes a point that most of us who follow this stuff closely always try to keep in mind.

You don’t need all the money in the world; just enough to clear the threshold that gets your message across. In a gubernatorial general election in this race, the first five million you raise is critical. If, after that, you raise another 50 million, it is not even half as meaningful as that first five - because that’s what gets you past the threshold.

There is one thing missing in all of this, though, and that’s the national Republican collapse. Charlie Cook wrote yesterday that the upcoming November election appears to be shaping up as “a very large tidal wave” for the Democrats. Whether the governor’s problems create a reverse impact here is the ultimate question.

If you knew that Barack Obama’s campaign had the goods on millionaire frontrunner Blair Hull and had already planned how best to use that devastating information would you have changed your mind about his chances three months before the US Senate primary? You didn’t know, of course, because it had to remain secret to be effective.

I really don’t know who will win this race, and I never have. I don’t know what sort of secret bombs each candidate plans to throw, and neither do the rest of us. Topinka’s problems with her right flank could be overcome with the corruption issue, but then again maybe not. There are a billion factors involved.

Anyway, your turn to discuss.