Reading between the lines in this excerpt from CQ Politics and their analysis of 2008 Congressional and Senate candidate recruitment, you get the feeling that South Dakota's Republican Party pretty much blew it in their recruitment of a U.S. Senate challenger against Sen. Tim Johnson.

South Dakota Senate:Republicans in generally GOP-leaning South Dakota were feeling at thetop of their game after the 2004 election in which former Rep. John Thunenarrowly unseated Democrat Tom Daschle, then the Senate Democraticleader, and they were anxious to turn their sights to Democratic Sen. Tim Johnsonin his expected bid for a third Senate term in 2008. He had just barelyescaped defeat in 2002, as Thune warmed up for his Daschle race byholding Johnson to a 524-vote margin. And Republican officials hopedpopular GOP Gov. Michael Rounds, who was easily re-elected in 2006, might take up the challenge toJohnson. But the near-fatal brain hemorrhage that Johnson suffered inDecember 2006, and his courageous comeback to return to his Senateduties and the campaign trail, changed everything. With Rounds takinghimself out of the mix early, the Republicans nominated a relativelylow profile state representative named Joel Dykstra,who at mid-year had about 10 percent of the fundraising receipts andabout one-fortieth the cash on hand that Johnson had compiled.