Well, we can see now why Hillary was out pre-emptively spinning a loss in Iowa yesterday. She expects one.

Democrat Barack Obama continued his upward momentum through the evening before the Iowa caucuses, capturing the lead ahead of rivals John Edwards and Hillary Clinton.. Meanwhile, Republican Mike Hucakbee widened his lead over Mitt Romney down the stretch, the newest and last Reuters/C–SPAN/Zogby daily telephone tracking poll in Iowa shows.

Obama broke through the 30% barrier for the first time, gaining 31% support after another strong day leading up to the caucuses. But more dramatic was Clinton’s four-point drop in this last day of tracking. Edwards moved into second place by himself after another day where he steadily gained ground.

Well, that’s a late collapse, more or less. And I don’t think the Pakistan story is what’s killing the beast, as fun as that would be.

On the GOP side it’s Huck in the lead, 31-25.

With a Huckabee surge and a Romney dip, the former Arkansas governor opened up a six-point lead over his nearest rival. Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson also lost a point, and Arizona Sen. John McCain, who has been surging in New Hampshire, faded here into a tie for fourth place.

Huckabee’s strength among women was notable – he leads Romney by a 37% to 25% margin, while enjoying a narrow 27% to 25% edge among men. Huckabee also continued to show well among those likely caucus-goers age 25-34 and age 35-54, where he held significant leads over Romney and the rest of the field.

Caveat: It’s Zogby. Caveat II: The Des Moines Register’s poll also puts Obama in front on the Dem side and Huckabee in front on the GOP side.

Huckamentum? Huckamentum. I suppose it’s some consolation that Huckabee at least actually grew up in a place called Hope.