With little over a month to go for the Iowa caucus, scheduled for Jan. 3, to start, the democratic candidates for president are fiercely campaigning and debating for the nomination for presidency of the party.
Despite receiving heavy criticism, Senator Hillary Clinton is still the frontrunner and national polls show that she’s at 44 percent, followed by Senator Barack Obama with 25 percent and former Sen. John Edwards at 14 percent, according to CNN.com. 
However, according to the ABC News Washington Post Poll, Obama is now leading the polls in Iowa with 30 percent of the vote.
Clinton managed to receive 26 percent and Edwards falls at 22 percent.
Clinton has been attacked by republicans as well as Obama for avoiding taking firm positions on controversial issues and from Edwards for inconsistencies on various issues.
Clinton, however, had a chance
to defend herself. “I don’t mind
taking hits on my record on issues, but when somebody starts throwing mud, at least we can hope that it’s both accurate and not right out of the republican playbook,” she responded to Edwards in the democratic debate in Las Vegas.
Obama is also attacking Clinton for reportedly stating that “agents of Sen. Hillary Clinton are spreading the word” on dirt from Obama to hurt his campaign.
“Senator Clinton should either make public any and all information referred to in the item, or concede the truth: that there is none,” responded Obama, who added that he will not tolerate “slime politics” or dirty politics.
Clinton’s campaign responded by stating that Obama is just echoing republican talking points.
“Voters should be concerned about the readiness of any democrat inexperienced enough to fall for this,” said Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
Obama’s campaign should be helped by influential supporter Oprah Winfrey, who will appear at his campaign Dec. 8 and 9 at the key states of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina with the hope of luring female voters and older voters toward Obama.
“Obviously to the extent that she can highlight some of the themes of our campaign, and reach some people who might not otherwise be thinking about politics, that’s great,” said Obama. “She’s a dear friend and I really appreciate that she’s taken the time out of her busy schedule.”
As for Clinton, she is convinced that she is the best candidate to win against the republicans due to her experience in battling the GOP.
Also, Edwards has launched two new television ads in Iowa and New Hampshire about why he is the ideal candidate for president who Americans can trust to stand up against corruption in Washington and fight for America’s working families.
Additionally, though they do not receive the adequate media coverage that Clinton, Obama or Edwards have, Sen. Joe Biden, Gov. Bill Richardson, Sen. Dennis Kucicinch, Sen. Chris Dodd and former Sen. Mike Gravel are also scheduled to campaign in the key states.
However, Richardson has announced that he will not be campaigning for Christmas and will be in New Mexico with his family. The other democratic candidates have yet to announce their plans.
The next democratic debate is scheduled for Dec. 10 on CBS in Los Angeles.
However, most of the candidates agreed that they would not participate in the debate if the Writer’s Guild of America is still on strike the day of the debate.
