NYTimes: 2 Top Democrats Will Not Contest Iowa's Caucuses by Adam Nagourney

Mr. Lieberman's advisers said on Sunday that they would pull out all but one of his 17 staff members in Iowa and send them to states considered more receptive to his appeal, like Arizona. General Clark's aides said he would maintain a minimal presence in the state, which has the nation's earliest presidential selection contest.

...The decisions drew a sharp reaction from state party leaders and from other Democratic candidates. Several predicted that that General Clark and Mr. Lieberman would come to regret their decisions, noting that no one who skipped the caucuses has ever won the Democratic nomination.

This is worse news for Lieberman's chances than for Clark's; Lieberman has at least been trying in Iowa for a long time and is now having to abandon it; the Clark people can claim (as they do in the article) that they're pulling out for solely strategic reasons given the limited calendar.

What fascinates me about this story, though, is that somehow the news came from both campaigns at the same time, which makes it sting less for both of them -- a story focusing only on Lieberman or Clark pulling out of a state would have a far more negative air to it.

So how did it happen? Did both of them independently come to this conclusion on the same day? (Yeah, right.) Did one wait for another campaign to announce it so that when called for comment they could say "Actually, we're pulling out too"? Did Lieberman and Clark have discussions about doing it simultaneously? (I doubt it.)

We won't know till the campaign books are written, but I'm mighty curious. Even with all the attention this race is getting from the news media and websites of all stripes -- and I would propose that we are seeing more of the inner workings of campaigns now than ever before -- there's so much we still don't see.