The late whispers are that The late whispers are that Barack Obama's campaign may benefit from either an announced or unspoken nod from the Joe Biden and/or Bill Richardson campaigns to have their non-threshold caucus-goers move to Obama. We already know that the Dennis Kucinich camp has instructed its supporters to do so. Perhaps this explains the eerie confidence that David Plouffe, Obama national director, was exuding tonight after Obama’s final event, held at the Hoover High School in Des Moines. “[John Edwards] is our main challenge for second-choice caucus-goers and Sen. [Hillary] Clinton is a much different area code with second-choicers,” he said, which is not news at this point. But this was a bit more revealing: “All I know is that of the [Bill] Richardson, [Chris] Dodd and [Joe] Biden people we are a very strong second-choice, Edwards we believe a little less so, and Clinton less so.” If Team Obama’s tracking and modeling is accurate, that means Edwards is a very strong second-choice among Clinton supporters, since he can’t be trailing Obama as the second preference among those preferring the second-tier candidates and be trailing Obama among Clinton supporters. We’ll see about that tomorrow, I guess. --Tom Schaller
