If you’ve been watching the television over the past week, you know that the 5th district congressional race is heating up.

Both campaigns are on the air with attack ads, and now the national parties are jumping in as well.

What does this tell me?... that this race is far from over. Public polling (mainly SurveyUSA) have show the Republican, State Senator Robert Hurt, with a commanding lead over Democratic incumbent Tom Perriello. And by commanding, I mean 23 points. That’s a blow out, if it’s true.

The Democrats have released their own polls, which show the race within the margin of error or tied. That of course has led to mass confusion in this race. What do you believe? Which polling outfit is correct? Are the Democrats just spinning us? Is SurveyUSA way off?

Well, the best indicator of what’s really going on is money. If the internal polling for the national Democrats showed Perriello behind by 23 points, I seriously doubt the DCCC would be investing precious campaign cash in ads in this district. They could spend that money in other districts where they are playing defense and actually have a better shot at prevailing.

Plus, Perriello had $2 million of his own campaign cash, so the national Dems could have easily figured that he could fight for himself.

Likewise, I doubt the national Republicans would still be playing in this race if Hurt was really ahead by 23 points, especially when you consider Hurt’s 3rd quarter fundraising numbers. The campaign released their tally today and it was more than $900,000. That’s impressive and is more than enough to get Hurt on the air. Yes, it’s a sprawling district, but the media markets are cheap, meaning ads buys aren’t that expensive.

The negative tone of the ads from both sides, also suggests that this race is not a done deal.

So, keep your eye on the 5th district. There are signs that this race is still competitive with just three weeks to go until election day.