If I had to guess, and I suppose I do, I’d say that Dean wins very narrowly, Gepahrdt and Kerry almost literally tie for second (I define a tie as anything within 1% of the vote (or, say, less than 1,200 votes) and Edwards makes a respectable 4th. The media will drop its 3 tickets out of Iowa mantra for two reasons. First, if Gephardt doesn’t come in first he’s probably going to have to drop out anyway, so why let the walking dead use-up one of those tickets? And, second, since the media — including me — got this whole race so wrong in the first place, it’ll hardly be in a position to issue binding fatwas on such things. In fact, regardless of rankings, the big media spin will be A) Dean’s Implosions B) the “photofinish” ending rendering it too close to call. You will hear the word photofinish a lot in the next 24 hours.
Note: my head wants me to say Gephardt will win — history says organization is better than passion — but my gut says Dean will squeak it out.