It’s been a little over a week since Congressman Denny Rehberg announced that he was challenging first-term U.S. Senator Jon Tester in 2012.

By many accounts, it has been a rocky first week for Rehberg. It was impressive that Rehberg had signs and/or bumper stickers ready to go and his Senate Campaign website was launched the same evening as his announcement as was his Twitter feed @Rehberg2012. He is also on Facebook.

It seems from this casual observer’s view that it was all planned out perfectly, except for maybe the speeches and talking points.

Even before Rehberg came out of the gates, Tester and the Democrats tried to link him to Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (both are House Tea Party Caucus members) and her plan to cut Veterans funding – a plan that Bachmann rightfully ditched after hearing from Veterans. (See TWW column on that subject HERE)

Then on the night of his announcement Rehberg reportedly uttered, “President Bachmann, where are you? “That sounds alright, doesn’t it? That sounds pretty good.” Politico picked up the story HERE. It wasn’t long before the Democrats were sending that clip around the country and raising money off of it.

Maybe the Rehberg campaign consultants have polling that shows people saying “President Bachmann” plays well in Montana. I guess we’ll see. If you watch the video, some people laugh and then start applauding. Honestly, I cringed when I heard it.

Then last Monday, Rehberg spoke to the Montana Legislature and mentioned the gray wolf population and a federal judge in Montana saying, “When I first heard his decision, like many of you I wanted to take action immediately,” Rehberg said. “I asked: How can we put some of these judicial activists on the Endangered Species list?”

I wrote a few days later that “it’s a stretch to say Rehberg threatened a Federal judge” and listed the sentence in context with the rest of the subject. I still believe that, but Rehberg opened the door and now those words are a nice tool for the Democrats to use against him.

Even the children of the federal judge have chimed in with a powerful letter to the editor called, “Inflammatory words inflame” writing, “For all Montanans, and on behalf of our family, we ask Congressman Rehberg to remember that words matter, and inflammatory words inflame.”

The children also used the “T” word (as in Tucson) writing, “We, too, are still trying to figure out exactly how he thought it appropriate or responsible to make these comments, especially in light of recent events in Tucson.”

So after all this in just the first week, we’re still 21 months from the General Election and you can bet these issues won’t be going away anytime soon – at least if the Democrats have anything to do about it.

Fortunately for Rehberg this senate race is more of a marathon than a sprint, plus he has a very vulnerable first-term Senator as his opponent. But if you are a supporter of Jon Tester, you are probably feeling a little better this week than you did about 10 days ago.