Here are a couple of interesting pieces on how the ongoing Obama-Clinton dustup is playing in two key early states.

In Iowa, David Yepsen of the Des Moines Register writes that while Obama and Clinton are trying to one-up each other, the real winners of the battle could be John Edwards, Bill Richardson, or even back-of-the-packers like Joe Biden. Yepsen recalls how in early 2004 Iowa frontrunners Howard Dean and Dick Gephardt bludgeoned each other to death with negative ads in the final days before the caucuses, allowing John Kerry to score a surprise upset and John Edwards to pull off a valuable "better than expected" finish. Yepsen writes:

This time, Edwards is running in first place in Iowa. Clinton and Obama trail. If Clinton and Obama engage in such negativity, they risk making each other radioactive and helping Edwards or one of the others.

As a result of this exchange, Edwards' supporters in Iowa are just reinforced in their belief that their guy is the one who can put together the best package: He can be a bit of a fresh face, bring some experience to the table and best understand their daily trials at the gut level.

If Clinton and Obama want to pick fights, perhaps they ought to pick one with Edwards since, in Iowa at least, he's still the guy to beat.

But perhaps Clinton should avoid picking fights with anybody. For someone like Clinton, who has very high unfavorable ratings, to go around throwing stones at others is just an invitation for them to hit at her many negatives.

Meanwhile, in the St. Petersburg Times, political writer Adam Smith looks at how Barack Obama's stated willingness to meet with Fidel Castro in the first year of his administration is playing with Cuban-Americans in Florida - and it's probably not what you might think:

Still, Florida Obama supporters and other Democrats say they've heard little or no backlash among Hispanic supporters since last week's comment on meeting with leaders of rogue countries.

In South Florida, anything that smacks of softness toward Fidel Castro or Hugo Chavez is politically volatile. So Ricky Arriola, a Cuban-American businessman in Miami who recently changed his party to Democrat to help Obama, immediately worried about the fallout when he heard Obama answer that question in South Carolina.

"But amazingly it's had no impact, there's been no buzz at all," said Arriola, 38. "If he'd said, 'End the embargo,' that would have been different, but the concept that you're willing to meet with some of those folks just isn't that inflammatory."

Hispanic voters make up only about 5 percent of the Democratic primary electorate, compared to as much as 18 percent of the Republican primary electorate and at least 12 percent of all Florida voters. The last Democrat to perform well among heavily Republican Cuban-Americans was Bill Clinton, who won 40 percent of the vote in 1996.

"Being soft on Cuba will not win you a Democratic primary in Florida, but can certainly cost you a general election, as Al Gore learned because of Elian Gonzalez," said Ana Navarro, a Republican consultant in Miami-Dade. "If Obama is the nominee, you can bet that his answer in that debate will be in a commercial for the Republican Party."