Countdown to Caucuses hits three

Only three days remain before Iowa Democrats gather in nearly two-thousand precinct-level Caucuses to help determine their party’s presidential nominee. The closing moments of this Caucus campaign are fast and furious as one poll shows the race is a dead heat, a virtual four-way tie. Massachusetts Senator John Kerry isn’t willing to talk about momentum. Kerry says it’s a tough race and will remain one down to the wire. Kerry says he’d rather have it going in one direction than the other, but he says there’s a lot of work yet to be done. Former Illinois Senator Carol Moseley Braun dropped out of the race yesterday. During an event in Carroll, Iowa, she threw up her support to Howard Dean. Braun says Dean has a program to put the country back on track and she said Dean “has the energy to inspire the American people.” North Carolina Senator John Edwards is telling Iowa audiences that his southern accent, and southern roots, make him the best candidate to defeat President Bush in key southern states which voted for Bush in 2000. Edwards says if he could “reach out there and grab” people by the shirt to get them to the Caucuses, he’d do it. Teamsters president James P. Hoffa joined Missouri Congressman Dick Gephardt at a union rally last night in Marshalltown. The Teamsters are among the 21 international unions that have endorsed Gephardt.