Obscured by all of the recent fundraising hype, John Edwards has quietly halved his distance behind Barack Obama for second place in the Democratic field. Just a couple of weeks ago Obama led Edwards by 14 points in the RCP Average (25.7% to 11.7%). Today Edwards has whacked over 7 points off of that deficit and now trails Obama by only 6.7 points, (Obama 22.1%, Edwards 15.4%).

This may be no more than Obama pulling back a little bit from an initial boost of euphoria that propelled him into the mid-20's, coupled with a bit of a sympathy boost for Edwards after the announcement of the return of his wife's cancer. Edwards, not unimportantly, also leads by 3.5 points in the Iowa RCP Average and trails Obama by less then three points in the New Hampshire RCP Average.

Obama and Clinton received much of the ink this week with their $20 million plus raises, but Edwards' $14 million is more than enough to make him competitive, and in the polls (at least over the last two weeks) he is in the one with the momentum in the Democratic field.