Obama takes the lead in Iowa

Barack Obama has finally pulled ahead in Iowa, according to the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll. He stands at 30 percent in the poll, compared to Clinton's 26 percent, although there is a 4 percent margin of error. Obama has already inspired a great deal of excitement in many people, and with the news of his lead, his campaign could earn a great deal of momentum. According to the Post, his lead seems to come from changing priorities in Iowa, where 55 percent of people said a "new direction and new ideas" was more important than "strength and experience" in this campaign. This is a 6 percent shift from The Post/ABC's last poll, which was in July. At that time, 49 percent said change was the most important, and 39 percent said experience. This would imply that Obama's lead comes from caucus-goers who are abandoning Clinton. But while Obama's support rose 3 points from 27 in July to 30 this month, Clinton's has stayed steady at 26 percent. John Edwards took the real hit, going down from 26 percent of the support in July to 22 percent this month. Now that Obama has a clear lead as the alternative to Clinton, he will probably only steal more votes from Edwards.

Clinton won't be taking this lightly, though, with only 43 days left until the Iowa caucus. She recently opened her 34th campaign office in Iowa, and she reportedly spent over $350,000 on TV and radio ads last week alone. Besides that, she is amplifying a rhetorical tactic she has always employed of talking like the winner. "I cannot wait to get on the stage to debate the Republican nominee as we make the case for change, and they argue for the status quo," she said in Iowa yesterday morning. She also said, "It takes a Clinton to clean up after a Bush," which doesn't seem like a line of thought you'd want to harp on when more and more Iowans are prefering change to experience.