Iowa Countdown: Songs, Jokes And The Redskins

Snapshots from the closing hours of the Iowa caucus:

Song choices: At John Edwards rallies, Bruce Springsteen's "The Rising." At Barack Obama's, Stevie Wonder's "Signed, Sealed and Delivered." At Hillary Clinton's, Dolly Parton's "9 to 5." At Mike Huckabee's rally in Des Moines last night, it was "Sweet Home Alabama" --except the candidate himself was on stage strumming guitar with a local band.

Edgy humor: Barack Obama is battling John Edwards for the votes of blue-collar Iowa men. Edwards is using macho populist rhetoric about fighting greedy corporations on behalf of the middle class. Obama, at a rally in Knoxville, interrupted an attack on drug companies to make a joke about Viagra, even pointing out "a satisfied customer" in the crowd.

Bridging the divide: The caucuses split the camps of the leading Democrats, but Washington sometimes unites them--at least in the case of the Washington Redskins. Inside a Des Moines sports bar, operatives for John Edwards and Barack Obama watched the Redskins defeat the Dallas Cowboys a few days ago, and broke into a spontaneous rendition of "Hail to the Redskins."

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