Obama wins

CNN and Fox are calling it for Obama. And it looks like Edwards and Clinton are still about tied.

Watch for a lot of spin now about how undemocratic and unrepresentative Iowa is from campaigns that would have been happy to trumpet the great and thoughtful Iowa voters if their fave had won.

Though I do agree that Iowa is undemocratic and unrepresentative.

This has got to be the death knell for the John Edwards campaign. He just doesn't have the money to compete at the level that will be necessary from here on out. He's going to fade away as the rest of the primaries progress. And where will his supporters go? I would bet that most of them are not going to go to Hillary.

The Clinton campaign has got to be sweating bullets now. Obama seems like the rock star he's been portrayed since the 2004 convention. He demonstrated that he could get young voters to come out and support him contrary to all the predictions that young voters wouldn't bother showing up. And he showed that a black man can win the votes in one of the whitest states in the union. People will be so excited about the thought of the first black president that they'll just want to believe in the Obama dream. And if he starts picking up former Edwards voters and continues to pull in money the way he's been doing, Hillary has got to be wondering how to stop him. Remember that a lot of the donors to the Obama campaign have not topped out in their donations and he can go back to them for more money while Hillary has more donors who have already given the maximum amount.

One report has it that the Clinton campaign is going to take on the Obama health care plan because it is not a single payer plan. Somehow I don't picture a wonkish discussion of the differences between their two plans is going to put a halt to the Obama excitement that people will sense after tonight.