John Edwards' campaign is either playing the expectations game brilliantly — or Camp Edwards is in big, big trouble.

"Thanks to you, we're within striking distance of our $9 million fundraising goal with just under 48 hours to go," Edwards said in an email to supporters today.

Nine million dollars actually happens to be more than Howard Dean raised in the second quarter of 2003, when he took the lead in the Dem field. But in today's environment it's simply a paltry total, particularly when compared to Hillary's predicted $27 million and Obama's potentially higher fundraising tally.

The Obama campaign today also sought to spin expectations in a similar fashion, sending out an email that explained and extolled their decision to seek funds only for the primary and not for the general election.

"In reality, the funds raised for the general election serve no purpose other than inflating a candidate's total," read the email.

The point being, of course, that if Hillary's total turns out to be higher than theirs, it's only because she's padding her numbers by including general election funds in their final tally.