Horserace Rankings - the Democrats

The order from most likely to win the Democratic nomination to least likely to win the Democratic nomination. Momentum direction in parenthesis. Republican rankings coming soon. Like the BCS, these rankings are generally retarded, unfounded in reality, but thankfully no computer component was used.

1) Hillary Clinton (down)

Though Iowa is looking more and more precarious for her by the day, she is still ahead in the other three early states, and has a huge lead in some of the February 5th states (ex. +26 in California, +31 in New York). Nationally, she still holds a large lead over Barack Obama and John Edwards. However, something must be causing her some alarm, as she has shifted her tone from ignoring her opponents to an all out attack on Barack Obama, who has been leading in Iowa according to three of the last five polls.

2) Barack Obama (up)

Where it matters, Obama is doing well. As I mentioned above, he's taken the lead in Iowa in three of the last five polls. In the previous 11 months, only 3 polls, all outliers, showed him in the lead, so this is definitely important. He's narrowed the gap in New Hampshire to the single digits, and, most importantly in my mind, seems to finally be taking the lead with African Americans in South Carolina. So far, he's responded well to the attacks from Hillary, even launching a new rapid response website, Hillary Attacks to respond to her allegations.

Will Obama be able to withstand the heat? All of his eggs are in one basket, Iowa, and to a lesser extent, South Carolina. If he doesn't win both of those states, it could be over.

3) John Edwards (up)

Edwards was playing the role of attack dog for a few weeks. He has since stopped, now staying above the fray (notable exception - in debates, where he's been the sharpest in taking Hillary on). Like Obama, all his eggs are in the Iowa basket, but to a greater extent. A weak showing in Iowa will finish Edwards, who's not showing much strength in South Carolina, which he won back in 2004.