LT. GOV. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend's march toward the governor's office proceeds as if success were foreordained. At virtually every critical juncture in the campaign's early stages, the Townsend forces have prevailed.

Virtually every ranking Democrat in Maryland has endorsed her. This was expected. But the unspoken truth is that many Democrats have concerns about her ability to govern, and it was remotely possible one or more would hold out.

She's going to have plenty of money for campaign advertising, attack and otherwise.

The challenger who seemed likely to give her real difficulty, Mayor Martin O'Malley of Baltimore, declined to run. Now she won't have a costly primary. Her party won't be torn and weakened, perhaps the only circumstance that could leave her vulnerable in the general election. She can save her resources for the Republican.

A potentially embarrassing defection to the GOP candidate did not occur. Ms. Townsend's friends and other considerations convinced Maryland's school superintendent, Nancy S. Grasmick, to remain a Democrat. Ms. Grasmick flirted with the idea of running for lieutenant governor with Rep. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., the likely Republican nominee.

As lieutenant governor, Ms. Townsend can rely on a steady diet of official or quasi-official events to propel her campaign through the summer.

So, she's a mortal lock, right? Maryland has twice as many registered Democrats as Republicans, so a Republican victory will demand a near-perfect race.

Mr. Ehrlich already lost an important public relations skirmish when Ms. Grasmick refused his offer.

And, days later, the GOP candidate's effort to seem middle-of-the-road hit a pothole. The Ehrlich camp sent a fund-raising letter to Republican givers in which they were urged to send money so that another Kennedy wouldn't end up in the White House. Anti-Kennedy fusillades are red meat for the right wing, of course, but throwing them out in 2-1 Democratic Maryland could inflame and mobilize the other side.

A gaffe of that sort comes, in part, as a result of Ms. Townsend's other successes. Every obstacle removed from her path, every endorsement and every rescued embarrassment (Ms. Grasmick's decision) sends a tremor into the opposition. A desperate-seeming appeal for money in a shrill anti-Kennedy letter would seem to be a case in point.

So, she's home free, right?

Not necessarily.

As a byproduct of her no-primary victory, there will be fewer opportunities to make a damaging gaffe. Throughout Maryland, addicted political insiders are collecting Kathleen malapropisms. Most of them are more endearing than damaging, but they could grow into a body of negative evidence. Some say that accretion of ship-scuttling material has already built to a level of concern for her. There's plenty of anti-Kathleen talk in the wind, but it hasn't reached anything like critical mass.

But her campaign faces at least two other concerns:

Democratic Party leaders keep offering evidence to support a federal judge's declaration that Annapolis has been engulfed in a "culture of corruption." Federal District Court Judge J. Frederick Motz made that observation after lobbyist and onetime Democratic Party official Gerard Evans was convicted of fraud.

Another insider, Bruce C. Bereano, had been convicted on mail fraud charges before that and seems to be flirting with serious trouble yet again. Republicans will say: In the culture of Annapolis, repentance and reform aren't necessary.

Competence may not be required, either. The Democrats' redistricting plan was ruled unconstitutional by the Court of Appeals. The court will now draw the legislative district map, embarrassing the Democrats and threatening to throw the election schedule off-kilter.

The court intervened because it found the map faulty - but also because Democratic state Sen. Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. made phone calls to judges while the redistricting matter was pending. High-handed, at least, possibly worse. The court had no choice but to take over.

It's all a made-to-order political indictment to be served by the Republican Ehrlich against the Democrat Townsend - even before one gets to issues such as Maryland's ominous financial condition, another matter Ms. Townsend will be asked to address.

So, is the race over? Or is it time to "clean out the mess in Annapolis?" Will Mr. Ehrlich be able to prosecute the case?

The jury, sometimes known as the voters, will be out until Nov. 5, Election Day.

C. Fraser Smith is an editorial writer for The Sun. His column appears Sundays.