Hillary Clinton eked out a narrow victory over Bernie Sanders last night in the Iowa caucuses, which has led to a lot of punditry. There’s one branch of that punditry that I think ought to be examined a bit more rigorously before it spreads. Here’s Ezra Klein, last night:

This morning, the smart money had it that Donald Trump would win Iowa, and Ted Cruz would come in second—but it was possible that Trump could under-perform and Cruz would win. Well, Ted Cruz has won Iowa. Donald Trump is in second, and Marco Rubio is in third. But according to “the narrative,” Donald Trump is tonight’s big loser, and Rubio the upset victor.

Soon we’ll have a winner in the first official contest of the 2016 election. For the Republicans, it’s likely to be Donald Trump, though it could be Sen. Ted Cruz. There is a small chance it will be Sen. Marco Rubio, the supposed “establishment” candidate. But it probably won’t be. And don’t worry: Losing—repeatedly and for a long time—is all part of Rubio’s master plan.

In preparation for tonight’s caucuses, Ted Cruz has spent nearly three-quarters of the past month campaigning in Iowa. That means his darling wife, Heidi Cruz, has also had to spend a lot of time in Iowa. And according to a source familiar with the Cruz family, Iowa is Heidi Cruz’s own living hell.

The Iowa caucuses are tonight. What’s going to happen? On the Republican side, either Donald Trump will win, or Ted Cruz will win. According to a poll conducted by Ann Selzer, unanimously considered the best pollster in Iowa, Trump will win. That’s a good reason to feel confident in a Trump victory.

Earlier tonight, Ted Cruz’s last big pre-caucus rally got hijacked when a heckler after our own hearts began to scream, “Ted Cruz looks so weird!” He then immediately proceeded to feign vomiting into a trash can.

With such a close race in the Iowa Caucuses last night, the cable news networks had to stay live into the wee hours of the morning. This proved to be a little much for some of them, as Stephen Colbert made clear on tonight's Colbert Report. Fox News' Bret Baier lost his ability to subtract simple sums and CNN's Erin Burnett had a little trouble mastering the network's new "flick" technology. All in all, it really makes a guy miss Tim Russert's trusty white board.

On tonight's Daily Show, Jon Stewart had his chance to address the results of the Iowa Caucuses. He paid special attention to the candidates' speeches, making sure to highlight Marcus Bachmann's doggie sunglasses shopping spree and Ron Paul's obscure reference to a couple of Austrian economists. Stewart also had some choice words for winner Mitt Romney and his public persona which he purchased along with his victory.

On tonight's Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert paid homage to the late great Paul the Octopus and introduced his own invertebrate prognosticator, an incredible snail by the name of Megyn Shelly. Amazingly, she was right on the money: she chose no one.

Well here we are, first voting night of the presidential season, and CNN is already completely insane, playing with ludicrous pastel penis holograms while Wolf Blitzer meanders around looking for some anxious correspondent to appear on a garish outer space screen and say nothing. Only in Iowa!...?? Let's get this over with.

The Gawker Political Desk will be covering the returns from Iowa tonight starting around 7:30 or 8. (Bad things happen if you start watching CNN's 80-person floppy muppet panel too early.) Pray to Allah for a Romney third-place finish!

Today is that great quadrennial celebration in American democracy: The eve of the day that our political system can completely stop caring about Iowa for another few years, aside from delivering the annual Christmas card of billions of dollars in useless farm subsidies. The Iowa caucuses, however, must be dealt with first, as Republican caucus-goers prepare to crown either Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, or Ron Paul as their new Harvest King tonight. How did things go so wrong? Let's go back and relive the crucial moments of this Iowa campaign season, together, by looking at some funny pictures and making dumb jokes.

We've got two options here: (1) A person sobs remembering times with his mother, who struggled with bipolar disorder and depression and died of cancer in 2003, or (2) Newt Gingrich does a very Newt Gingrich thing in trying to save his campaign by crying a couple of days before voting starts. Or (3), some sort of comibination. We've got three options here! You decide.

It's the best part of any presidential election cycle: That period a few days before the Iowa caucuses when no one's working and so you just type some nonsense about the weather in Iowa. What if the weather is snow? Someone wins. What if it is anti-snow, or sun? Well in that case the other schmuck wins.

Will the Occupy movement destroy the comely state of Iowa? Considering that they plan on interrupting a few caucuses and hollering in some offices, one can safely assume... no. But whatever they're planning on doing, it's apparently enough to scare the Iowa Republican party into secret bunkers, where they'll be safe from this nefarious grasp of "political activists."

For the two or three of you who don't spend every Saturday night watching Fox News already, you'll definitely want to tune in tomorrow evening. Mike Huckabee is teasing a "very important announcement" that he plans to make on his show. The inside bet is that he's pregnant again. But it may also have something to do with that 2012 presidential race that he'd be a frontrunner in.