Iowa Democrats hosted a boisterous Jefferson-Jackson dinner last night, with 9,000 enthusiastic attendees packing the Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Des Moines. If you missed C-SPAN's coverage, most of the candidates posted their appearances on YouTube: Dodd, Edwards, Obama, Richardson, and Clinton (though Clinton's clip is only a brief excerpt). Biden hasn't posted his speech, while Kucinich and Gravel weren't invited because they lack, according to the state party, "active campaigns in Iowa."

Whether the J-J dinner is even capable of shaking up the race is unclear. As the NYT noted, "The dinner here has become a signature event on the Iowa political calendar [but] the vast majority of attendees had already chosen a candidate, so the practical political effect of the night was uncertain."

That said, The Des Moines Register's David Yepsen, arguably most respected political voice in Iowa's media, seems to have declared Barack Obama the big winner of the night. "Five of them gave really good speeches," Yepsen said. "Barack Obama's was excellent."

It was one of the best of his campaign. The passion he showed should help him close the gap on Hillary Clinton by tipping some undecided caucus-goers his way. His oratory was moving and he successfully contrasted himself with the others - especially Clinton - without being snide or nasty about it. [...]

Obama was particularly impressive Saturday night. Should he win the Iowa caucuses, Saturday's dinner will be remembered as one of the turning points in his campaign in here, a point where he laid down the marker and began closing on Clinton, the national frontrunner.

In a recent TPMtv interview, Markos Moulitsas asked where the Obama from the 2004 convention had gone. I argued that, if anything, Obama was too much like he was in 2004 -- in the "Audacity of Hope" speech, he offered practically no partisan red-meat, and didn't mention Bush, Cheney, or Republicans at all. In today's political climate, it's awfully tough to win primary fight, especially from second place, with a post-partisan worldview.

If last night's speech was any indication, Obama is now trying to strike a balance, threading an ideological needle. He used '04 themes ("I don't want to pit blue America against red America, I want to lead the United States of America"), while slamming Bush-style politics ("The era of Scooter Libby justice, Brownie incompetence, and Karl Rove politics will finally be over"), and subtly criticizing the Democratic frontrunner ("Not answering questions because we're afraid our answers won't be popular just won't do it").

Apparently, it was a rhetorical challenge that worked pretty well, though one can't help but wonder what the race would look like now if Obama had hit some of these same notes sooner.