DES MOINES, Iowa -- "Nailed it. He nailed it," Jeff Jared exclaimed as he listened to U.S. Rep Ron Paul rebut an opponent on Wednesday night's CNN/YouTube Republican presidential debate.

His voice could hardly be heard above the cheering of Paul partisans gathered in a dingy down Des Moines storefront.

Later, as televised talking heads began to dissect the debate, Dr. Drew Ivers, Mr. Paul's Iowa campaign manager, assured the buoyant crowd that poll findings to the contrary, their march to the Jan. 3 caucuses was right on schedule.

"Mr. Romney peaked too early," he insisted. "Mr. Huckabee, not so much, but he, too, is peaking too early."

That analysis surprised Eric Woolson, the Iowa campaign manager for Mr. Huckabee. "I have to admit. When I started at this two years ago, I did not foresee that question ever coming up."

The fast-approaching Iowa caucuses have brought up a lot of questions, some anticipated and some surprising, as the days before the first balloting of the 2008 race countdown.

On the Republican side, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, for months the clear leader in the race, now faces a surging insurrection from Mr. Huckabee, the Baptist minister and former Arkansas governor.

Among the Democrats, three closely grouped figures are struggling in an increasingly acrimonious race in which none has been able to forge a lead beyond most polls' margins of error since the early fall.

That at least, is the conventional poll-derived wisdom. But one expert on the process, former Democratic Gov. Tom Vilsack, says that uncertainty is the only certainty about the arcane process that formally launches the presidential sweepstakes.

"You just can't poll the Iowa caucuses," he said. "You just don't know who is going to show up."

Mr. Vilsack had hoped to be in the mix. Although he was the first to declare his candidacy, he folded his cash-strapped effort after just a few months. His candidate now is Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who flew into nearby Ankeny Wednesday to renew a heated a heated rhetorical battle with Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

Democratic race 3-way

Mrs. Clinton has questioned her Senate colleague's experience and criticized his recent prescriptions for Social Security. But her latest and most persistent line of attack has focused on his health care plan, which would not require that every individual purchase insurance. Like that of their rival, former North Sen. John Edwards, Mrs. Clinton's plan would mandate universal coverage.

Mrs. Clinton's attacks involve a real difference in the proposals, but Mr. Obama argues that it is a slight, wonkish distinction and that his plan would move the nation toward universal care. And, he argues, he is better equipped to persuade Congress to enact significant health care reform because he isn't burdened by the history of hyper-partisan battles that helped sink Mrs. Clinton's first, abortive effort at reform.

Mr. Obama's numbers are rising in Iowa, but Mrs. Clinton remains in a good position. One of her strengths is the special appeal her candidacy holds for women and the fact that surveys show that Democratic women are particularly likely to cite health care as their most important issue.

As she worked the rope line after her speech in a community college gym Wednesday night, Mrs. Clinton spent several moments with Vivian Dunsberger, a mother who poured out her story of a daughter who can't get a job, or health insurance, because she suffers from fibromyalgia, a painful nerve disease. After their conversation, Mrs. Clinton embraced her before moving down the line.

"I've been impressed not just at the number of women who show up, but at the kinds of women," Mr. Vilsack said. "You'll see many, many seniors. You'll see women who tell her they were born before women had the right to vote."

The differences in the health plans are not new, but Mrs. Clinton's criticisms do represent a turn in her tactical approach to the race. In interviews with the Chicago Tribune and Des Moines Register this past week, she described her approach as a natural response to the attacks of her rivals.

Mr. Edwards has also criticized her -- he labels here as a creature of the interest group culture of Washington -- but her focus on Mr. Obama's well-funded campaign suggests that he is the one she's worried about.

Mr. Edwards, however, retains assets that could still salvage his make-or-break campaign in Iowa.

In an exercise that places a premium on organization, the former senator has nurtured his Iowa ties non-stop since his second place showing here four years ago. He has the support of important unions including locals of the United Auto Workers and the United Steelworkers.

In Iowa City Thursday night, more than 300 Iowans formed a standing-room only crowd to hear an Edwards speech on trade and foreign policy. President Bush served as his chief target, but he also repeated his denunciations of trade deals associated with the administration of former President Bill Clinton.

Asked to compare his views on trade with Mrs. Clinton, he said, "We have a different approach to trade and my approach is that if it's not good for middle-class Americans it's not a good trade deal."

He never mentioned Mr. Obama.

Jostling below this first tier of contenders are the long-shots hoping for lightning to strike in the form of a third-place finish and a resulting jolt of national media attention.

Two of them, Sens. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware and Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, ran into one another Wednesday morning in a hotel hallway outside a meeting of the Iowa Association of Counties. The pair had been the subject of a Des Moines Register feature the previous day that compared their similar records and similarly tough odds in next month's caucuses.

"It's the only way we can get on the front page," Mr. Biden joked as he put his arm around Mr. Dodd's shoulder.

"OK, I'm in the barrel," Mr. Biden observed as he broke off to address the county officials.

Their trailing positions are not the result of lack of effort. Like New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, who has visited each of Iowa's 99 counties in his campaign, the two senators have worked hard here. Mr. Dodd even moved his family to Des Moines for the duration of the campaign.

Mr. Richardson has nudged his way into fourth place, with poll showings in the low double-digits, while Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Obama and Mr. Edwards regularly register in the mid-20s. Mr. Biden has managed to hover around 5 percent, but Mr. Dodd has been mired at the bottom with Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio.

Running without Giuliani

On the Republican side, in Iowa at any rate, it's the big two.

The free-spending Mr. Romney was organized early and, in contrast to his trailing position in national polls, forged an early lead. In recent weeks, however, Mr. Huckabee has moved up in the assessment of virtually every observer, and has scored first place in at least one poll. His folksy manner and appeal to the vital Christian conservative constituency here has fueled a momentum that has propelled him to the stronger showing.

Referring to an October gathering of Christian conservatives in Washington, Mr. Woolson, his Iowa manager, said, "The Values Voters summit, and an appearance on the Glenn Beck Show [a radio talk show] seemed to be some kind of tipping point; you could feel something happening after that."

Mr. Woolson insists that any place in the top three in Iowa would count as a victory for their campaign, but a variety of observers, including Mr. Vilsack, are now predicting an outright win for the former Arkansas governor.

Mr. Huckabee's higher profile, however, is already making him a larger target in the race. Pat Toomey, the former Pennsylvania Senate candidate who now heads the Club for Growth, a group of economic conservatives, has been particularly derisive of Mr. Huckabee's record in Arkansas. Asked in an interview in the National Review if his group would carry its criticisms to the Iowa airwaves, he said, "Stay tuned."

Mr. Huckabee is at a distinct financial disadvantage compared to Mr. Romney, but Mr. Woolson, argues that the campaign has entered a phase where news coverage trumps advertising in reaching voters. Already the Iowa airwaves are back-to-back with campaign commercials.

"It's going to be wall-to-wall ads," he predicted. "People are just going to tune them out."

Mr. Romney's Iowa hierarchy projects a serene air in the face of the newly energized rival.

Reflecting the businesslike character of the campaign, their headquarters is in a neat corporate campus in a Des Moines suburb.

"We focused on the importance of Iowa early. We've worked to develop a robust campaign organization county-by-county and precinct-by-precinct," said Gentry Collins, Mr. Romney's state director.

The evident strength of that organization led the campaigns of Mr. McCain and former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani to decide not to compete with Mr. Romney in the Iowa GOP's straw poll last summer, an event that boosted Mr. Huckabee with a surprise second-place finish.

Given the lack of top-tier competition, was it a good use of the Romney campaign's resources to concentrate on the now barely remembered exercise?

"Absolutely," said Mr. Gentry. "The casualties of the straw poll included those who decided not to play. Rudy Giuliani was in the lead when he decided not to play. He hasn't been up there since. The other thing it did was identify our strengths and weaknesses as an organization, and that will pay dividends on the third. It was a no-brainer."

Mr. Gentry acknowledges the newly formidable challenge of the Huckabee forces, but he professed confidence in the organizational resilience of the Romney campaign.

Referring to Mr. Huckabee's late surge against a campaign that had long been in first place here, Tim Albrecht, Mr. Romney's state press secretary said, "The analogy you here is the tortoise and the hare. But don't forget that in that story, the hare goes to sleep before the race is over. We've never slept."

Confounding rules

All this will be played out in Thursday night precinct caucuses here in the first week of January that will be competing with the Orange Bowl game for Iowans' attention.

The Republican rules are fairly straightforward. While the Republican balloting is described as a caucus, it is really a virtual primary, with a straightforward accounting of the votes of those who show up. The Democratic Party process is more arcane. Its results are reported in terms of how many delegates each candidate manages to gather in a competition that includes election night maneuvering and horse-trading.

On caucus night at each of the state's 1,784 precincts, Democratic caucus-goers will be asked to segregate themselves into groups according to their candidate preferences. Anyone who will be 18 by Election Day, 2008 may participate, whether or not they have been registered a Democrat in the past.

A precinct captain will count the numbers in each group and decide first, whether each has enough votes to be eligible to win at least one delegate. Typically, a candidate would have to have the support of at least 15 percent of the total in the room to be deemed viable, but that figure can vary since some precincts award more delegates that others.

After that, the members of the groups that passed the viability threshold have a chance to attempt to persuade the nonviable voters and those who were undecided to join their groups. After that sorting-out takes place, the precinct captain reports the number of delegates won by each candidate.

Atul Nakhasi, a junior at the University of Iowa, is president of the University Democrats. With his opposite number for the college Republicans, he's organized training session on caucus rules. Of the planned hour-long session, he said, "We'll probably spend 10 minutes on the Republican rules and 50 on the Democrats."

As he left the Iowa City gathering, Mr. Edwards was asked whether the Christmas week caucuses would allow him to take a holiday break.

"There won't be much break," he said. "I will be spending an enormous amount of time in Iowa. I assume we'll take Christmas day off, but there won't be much. We're down to crunch time."