In his trips to Iowa last summer, Mike Huckabee often joked about how he was actually the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination, notwithstanding polls showing his support in the low single digits. "None" was polling higher than Giuliani, Romney, or McCain, and Huckabee would grandly announce, "Ladies and gentlemen, I am none of the above."

Huckabee's remarkable victory in the last poll taken in Iowa--the caucuses themselves--was no joking matter to Mitt Romney, who finished a distant second after leading in Iowa polling for much of the year. Huckabee's victory means that the former Arkansas governor will be a serious contender for the nomination at least through the Florida primary on January 29.

Huckabee aides already see a path leading to the nomination: Finish third in New Hampshire on January 8, be competitive in Michigan on January 15, win South Carolina on January 19 and then Florida on January 29, with those victories creating the dynamic for eventual victory. As one aide told me on the eve of the Iowa caucuses, "Four weeks from today he'll either be the nominee or he'll not be."

Huckabee's run a low-budget campaign, and what he needs is a massive infusion of funds to compete in January's fast-paced back-to-back primaries (not to mention in the 19 that take place on February 5's "Super Tuesday"). Most of the money would go to advertising. (Huckabee hasn't entirely ruled out negative ads, so watch for them in South Carolina, where, leading in the polls, he doubtless will face an avalanche of attack ads from Romney.) But funds are also needed to expand Huckabee's staff. He has real talent in his employ--the few ads he ran in Iowa were works of political genius--but the staff is tiny as presidential contenders go. He has few full-time aides and few consultants. He doesn't have a real policy shop or the capability to do his own polling.

None of this hurt Huckabee in Iowa because it is the first state on the presidential nominating schedule. A candidate can target it for months, as Huckabee did, working the state, an aide told me, as if he were in "a race for governor." But only a large national staff can meet the geographical challenges of the intensifying campaign.

While Huckabee's ability to meet the practical demands of January will turn on how well his fundraising goes, this, too, presents a problem. After all, any time a candidate spends asking for money is time the candidate is not at some rally asking for votes.

Huckabee's other challenge is whether he can expand beyond his political base. In Iowa, the entrance polls showed that 60 percent of Republican caucus-goers identified themselves as either "evangelical" or "born-again Christians." Forty-six percent of that group supported Huckabee, a Southern Baptist pastor before entering politics who ran ads highlighting his faith. They accounted for more than 80 percent of his caucus-winning total. Only in a few states--South Carolina is one--are evangelicals likely to constitute anywhere close to such a large portion of the Republican electorate as they did in Iowa.