A reliable source tells us at Various Things & Stuff that — despite two weeks of almost unceasing bad publicity — the Review-Journal will report in Wednesday’s editions that U.S. Rep. Jim Gibbons still leads his Democratic rival, state Sen. Dina Titus, by 4 percentage points in a statewide survey.

That’s a remarkable number for Gibbons, who has had to defend himself against allegations that he assaulted waitress Chrissy Mazzeo after a night of drinking at McCormick & Schmick’s in the Howard Hughes Center. And it comes after a District Court judge ordered the release of videotapes from a nearby parking garage — where the assault allegedly happened — that reportedly show neither Mazzeo nor Gibbons.

The second most asked question in the media in the last two weeks — after "did Gibbons do it?" — has been, "what impact is this having on the race?" The most recent R-J poll showed Gibbons with 45 percent and Titus with 36 percent — a difference of 9 percentage points. Clearly, the race has narrowed if the gap is now 4 percent. But will that be enough to put Titus over the top on Election Day? Especially against the backdrop of the tapes story?

We’ll know in one week.

Release the tapes.

That’s our view of what should happen at 11 a.m. today in the courtroom of District Court Judge Douglas Herndon, who is being asked to release the parking garage video that allegedly doesn’t show U.S. Rep. Jim Gibbons assaulting cocktail waitress Chrissy Mazzeo.

Gibbons and his attorney, Don Campbell, want the tapes released because they say Gibbons is vindicated and Mazzeo is proven a liar. (Full disclosure: Campbell has represented CityLife and the Review-Journal in the past; both newspapers are owned by Stephens Media LLC.)

If Mazzeo says she was pushed up against a wall by Gibbons at a certain time, in a certain place, under a certain camera, and the incident is not on the video, then Gibbons is in the clear, Campbell argues. (Not necessarily, we reply: What if the incident happened just as she said, but in a different place? What if the cameras weren’t recording the particular place where the incident happened, or were malfunctioning in general? Questions like these still remain.)

Meanwhile, Richard Wright, the attorney for Mazzeo, says the tapes shouldn’t be released, now that his client has gone down to the police department and signed a statement indicating she will cooperate in an investigation of the Oct. 13 incident. The process-minded Wright says releasing the tapes would constitute giving evidence over to a criminal defendant. That only happens, he said, in a Saturday Night Live skit. (Actually, Mr. Wright, that’s too clever for a Saturday Night Live skit, but we may borrow it for a skit on our show, Political Insiders, which airs at 11:30 p.m. Saturday – ironically, against Saturday Night Live and 5 p.m. Sunday on KTNV Channel 13.)

But we tend to agree with Campbell: The tapes should be released, and for many reasons. First, the public should have a right to see them, since they are relevant to the honesty and truthfulness of a candidate who will stand for election in less than a week. “By withholding the … surveillance tapes from the public during the ongoing early voting and the eve of the general election [police] are depriving the voting public of vital information that could help clarify unfounded allegations against one of its candidates for governor,” Campbell wrote in his petition.

Second, releasing the tapes may help clarify where the incident allegedly took place. Gibbons says he walked Mazzeo up to, but not in to, the garage. She says he walked with her into the garage, and then assaulted her before she was able to break free. As Wright says, “if in fact there is a tape of wherever it was, then Gibbons and she will be there. If she isn’t or he isn’t, then it’s not the tape or it’s been altered.”

A bold statement that rests squarely upon Mazzeo’s credibility. But it does lead us to another point: Release of the tapes will allow attorneys on both sides to have independent experts determine if the tapes really are from the garage at the time in question, and if they have been altered. (We’re sure the police are looking at that very possibility right now, too.) If Mazzeo is telling the truth, and the tapes don’t show the incident, then we have another, very important question: Where did the fake tape come from?

Both Mazzeo and Gibbons have the right to tell their stories and amass whatever evidence there is to support them, and the release of the tapes furthers that end. Moreover, as this is a matter of significant public interest, the public has a right to see for themselves what is, or is not, on those tapes, and to decide how that impacts both sides from there.

For those reasons, we hope Judge Herndon grants Campbell’s motion later this morning.

Until then, let’s munch on some quick hits, shall we?

• R-J columnist John L. Smith weighs in on the Gibbons-Mazzeo matter today, taking a look at both sides of the case. Some excerpts:

¶ “She [Mazzeo] shouldn’t necessarily be condemned for having second thoughts about taking on one of Nevada’s most influential politicians.” Wait a second, we thought Mazzeo was accusing Jim Gibbons of wrongdoing. Has she accused an influential politician, too? Who is it? Who? Who? Who?

¶ “[Don] Campbell [Gibbons’ attorney] has made a strong rhetorical case for Gibbons innocence and Mazzeo’s instability.” Whoa. Campbell has made a strong case for Gibbons, and it’s bolstered by the parking garage tapes that have come to light. But “instability”? Campbell’s not a doctor, and neither is Smith. That’s a loaded word. And the wrong word.

But we do agree with Smith on one point: Mazzeo’s decision to go forward with a complaint against Gibbons is a good thing, because this is a matter that needs to be resolved – conclusively – one way or another.

• And the R-J weighed in on another Mazzeo story, the tale of the missing title. If you haven’t read it, you should. All the way to the end, if you please, where Mazzeo comes out as a person who tried to make a Henderson couple whole after some financial shenanigans over a pickup truck she was selling that involved an ex-boyfriend.

The couple did put up more than $12,000 – which they lost – in the deal, but it doesn’t appear to be entirely Mazzeo’s fault. And when the police were called? “This case lacks any prosecutable merit and is a civil issue between Chrissy Mazzeo” and the would-be truck purchaser, a police report indicates.

Even if Mazzeo did commit some wrong in the truck caper, does that mean she’s lying now? Of course not.

• And the Las Vegas Sun suggests in a front-page story today that there may be a perfectly good explanation for why Gibbons and Mazzeo don’t appear on the tapes. If the cameras were feeding to a video recorder via “sequencing,” in which images are recorded from a series of different cameras in sequence, it’s possible for people to have been in the garage and unobserved by cameras for several minutes.

And if that’s true, the tapes could be worthless, which means we’re back to gathering as much circumstantial and witness information as we can to make sense of what really happened that night.