If the Iowa Democratic caucuses hadn’t been such a disaster overall, the big story right now wouldn’t be the tight race between South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-V.T.

It would be the “disaster” of Joe Biden, who finished behind not only Buttigieg and Sanders, but also Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.

“The fact of the matter is fourth place for Joe Biden is catastrophic,” NBC’s Chuck Todd said. “There’s no other way to put it.”

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The former vice president didn’t expect to win the Iowa caucuses, and isn’t the front-runner for this week’s first-in-the-nation primary in New Hampshire, either.

But he was expected to put up a fight and hold out until he hits his so-called “firewall,” South Carolina, where an expected strong showing later this month would give him a surge in delegates, news coverage and campaign donors.

But his weaker-than-expected Iowa finish means he’s in trouble — and it could be over in days for the former Vice President, should he fail worse in New Hampshire.

“I’m not going to sugarcoat it: We took a gut punch in Iowa,” he told supporters on Wednesday. “The whole process took a gut punch. But this is not the first time in my life that I’ve been knocked down.”

But can he get back up again? With Biden falling further behind in polls of New Hampshire ahead of this week’s first-in-the-nation primary, there are already whispers surrounding his campaign.

Insiders think there’s a chance it could be over before it began.

“The big problem he has is not only the deficiencies that showed in his appeal, but he is dead broke, and he needs to raise money,” David Axelrod, a former strategist for former President Barack Obama, warned on CNN.

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That’s the name of the game: money.

And Biden, despite leading in the national polls of Democrats, doesn’t have a lot of it.

He began the year with less than $9 million cash on hand, far less than each of his four main rivals, according to the New York Times. The newspaper reported that his campaign was scrambling to move that money around, canceling an ad buy in South Carolina and moving it to Nevada.

Biden has at least four fundraisers scheduled for this week – but a poor showing in New Hampshire could keep checkbooks closed.

“It is hard to raise money off of an anemic fourth-place finish, so he needs to revive himself in New Hampshire or this firewall that everybody talks about in South Carolina may just not be there for him,” Axelrod said.

Indeed, the firewall is already showing signs of cracking.

Biden had a commanding lead in polls of South Carolina throughout 2019.

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In November, he peaked in a CBS News/YouGov poll that put him 28 points ahead of his closest rival, with 45 percent to Warren’s 17 percent.

But a Post and Courier poll released last month shows his lead gap has plunged to just 5 points, with Biden at 25 percent compared to 20 percent for Sanders (Warren has fallen to fourth place with 11 percent).

What’s more, he’s showing signs of losing his core voting block: African-Americans.

Biden was supposed to be the one Democrat with widespread appeal to this demographic, thanks at least in part to serving under the nation’s first African-American president, Barack Obama.

But that support is eroding… badly.

The Post and Courier poll finds his support of the state’s black voters has fallen from 50 percent to 30 percent.

And while he still is in the lead, billionaire Tom Steyer is now nipping at his heels with 24 percent support among African-Americans in South Carolina after an aggressive ad campaign in the state.

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That could lead to a disaster in the state’s Feb. 29 primary – one that could empty out his campaign coffers as donors look for another candidate.

“It’s now an open question whether Biden will have the cash to pay for his charter plane to fly him around the 14 Super Tuesday states that vote on March 3,” wrote Edward-Isaac Dovere in the Atlantic.

Maybe he can take Amtrak?

— Walter W. Murray is a reporter for The Horn News. He is an outspoken conservative and a longtime journalist for The Horn News.