(From the Chicago Report)

If I were Dean I'd forget about Iowa. I would not fret about it, apologize for it, or hesitate for a second. I wouldn’t spend another dime trying to take on Gephardt. Cut my losses, it's as easy as that. This is not a mystical revelation, its a simple cost benefit analysis.

First of all, there is the significant cost in resources that campaigning in any state requires. A candidate must have offices and employees. He or she must run ads and commercials targeting local sentiments. He must make regular visits and shake millions of hands and that costs time. That's time that could be spent on the same activities in other states. All this is heightened when you’re in a close race in a particular state as Dean is in Iowa. Recently the DesMoines Register reported that a local poll has Gephardt inching ahead of Dean in Iowa which means that if Dean wants to win, he’ll have to expend even more resources.

“But what about all Dean's money?” you ask. True Dean has a cash advantage, but that doesn't mean that he shouldn't be frugal. If he wins the primaries he still has to take on Bush in the fall and at the moment, Bush isn't spending a dime. If Dean doesn't manage his resources well his fall campaign will likely sputter.

Moreover, there is a risk in taking on Gephardt in Iowa. Gephardt knows he has nothing to lose and you have to figure that his campaign is banking on Iowa. They're probably willing to spend any sum to win, because if they don't they've got to fold. Don't try to bluff a guy who’s willing to go all in, especially if you think he's actually got a hand.

Afterall, a win in Iowa doesn't mean all that much now that Clark isn't in the heat. Clark is considered Dean's major challenger, which means he has to quickly show that he can beat him. A win over Clark proves something; a win over Gephardt or Kerry doesn’t (at least not right now).

While Dean is playing the caucus game with the Dickie Gephardt, Clark is shrewdly positioning himself to stop Dean's surge after NH. Clark isn't wasting his time with Iowa, and probably isn't even planning to win NH (even though he does want to make a good showing). He started way too late in those states. What Clark can do is win South Carolina on February 2nd (as Bush did in 2000) and use that win to gain momentum for the Michigan Primary on the 7th and the Tennessee and Virginia primaries on the 10th (both important southern states in which Dean is likely to have troubles). Clark's successful execution of this strategy could quickly put an end to the Dean insurgency. This is especially the case if Dean has yet to get the party insiders behind him. In this scenario we would see a showdown on Super Tuesday, March 2nd.

All this becomes especially important when you consider that the Democrats have restructured their primaries to assign delegates proportionally. The number of delegates to be gained from a win in Iowa in New Hampshire is even less important than before. In contrast, a good showing in the bigger states of SC and Michigan has become more important.

Last, if Dean were to pull out of Iowa it would even further de-legitimate that caucus so that a win for Gephardt would really mean absolutely nothing to the rest of the country.

The Dean and his manager Joe Trippi have to be careful not to let all the media’s "frontrunner" talk go to their heads. He is still in a close race. He's better off taking all the resources that he is spending in Iowa and sending them to South Carolina. Clark is a southerner and has the endorsement of a former Governor. Dean is from Vermont and has made a couple of controversial statements about the south. If he doesn't get to work he's likely to get outflanked by the Clark campaign.

Be sure I have no personal interest in the matter, but the analyst in me can't help pointing out obvious mistakes.