Could Democrat Laura Fjeld pull off the extraordinary and defeat Mark Walker in this strongly Republican district? Of course. It’s possible. Then again, there are a lot of things in politics that are possible but not particularly likely to happen, and a Congresswoman Laura Fjeld is probably one of them.

Consider: the 6th district is strongly conservative, Mitt Romney won there by about 18 points, and we’re in a midterm that should favor the GOP. Walker probably starts off with a double-digit lead in any case. To win, Fjeld is going to need some breaks – a lot of breaks.

That said, Democrats should be heartened that they have a decent candidate here just in case Walker somehow implodes. And really, there’s so much that could happen. Maybe he’ll use a racial slur, or make a comment about “legitimate rape.” Maybe he’ll choke a campaign tracker or prove to have a fondness for sending explicit pictures of himself through Twitter. Or something else completely different. And in the unlikely event that Walker does implode, Fjeld will be well-positioned. That’s why it’s always important to recruit good candidates, even in tough districts. You never know what might happen.

Unfortunately for Democrats, they don’t seem to have done a very good job following this advice when it comes to recruitment for legislative districts. In the next few weeks we’ll be looking at a number of races that should be competitive on paper but where Democrats nominated seriously flawed candidates, or even worse, failed to run anyone at all. That’s absolutely unacceptable in a year where a backlash against the legislature is very much conceivable.

As the old saying goes, “80% of success is showing up.” Laura Fjeld probably won’t win, but at least she showed up. And who knows? Thanks to just showing up, she might win a seat in Congress this November. Much stranger things have happened in politics.