FOR countless Democrats around America, the announcement last week of a new initiative linking Senator Hillary Clinton to one of her party’s most appealing new stars amounted to a match made in political heaven.

Not since President George W Bush crushed the Democratic party’s hopes in last November’s election have two senators with perhaps the strongest chances of beating Republican rivals to the White House formed such an intriguing alliance.

Clinton has been linked with Senator Barack Obama, the charismatic black Democrat from Illinois, in a healthcare initiative that unites two formidable and ambitious politicians who have their eyes on making US presidential history.

The details of the senators’ health proposals were in danger of being swamped last week by renewed speculation about how long America might have to wait for either its first woman or first black president.

“This is a powerful partnership,” noted Norman Ornstein, a political specialist at the American Enterprise Institute, one of Washington’s most influential think tanks.

Obama’s emergence as a popular national figure has helped fuel optimism in Democratic ranks that the Republicans will not recover from a recent series of crushing setbacks — including widespread criticisms of the government’s hurricane-relief actions, the criminal indictment of one of the party’s leaders on Capitol Hill and Bush’s continuing problems over Iraq.

Ever since he burst onto the political scene with a spellbinding speech to the Democratic convention last year, Obama, the 44-year-old son of a black Kenyan father and white American mother, has been tipped for the highest office. His autobiography, Dreams from My Father, was on bestseller lists for more than a year.

He comfortably won his 2004 Illinois Senate race but, taking a leaf from Clinton’s book, adopted a low profile as a novice senator during his early months in Washington. He spent most of his time cultivating Illinois contacts and working quietly in a junior role on several Senate committees.

All that changed when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans. Appalled by what he described as America’s “historical indifference” to the plight of poor black people, Obama accused government planners of being “detached from the realities of inner-city life in New Orleans”, saying the Bush administration “simply doesn’t recognise what’s happening in large parts of the country”.

On one visit to affected areas he appeared at a press conference given by former presidents George Bush Sr and Bill Clinton, and was spotted chatting to Hillary.

Although the two had often crossed paths in Senate corridors, Obama had previously made clear to reporters that he was not seeking the kind of leadership role Clinton now fills in her party.

“What Senator Clinton did when she first came in was what any person would do when they come into a new environment, that is listen and learn before you speak and you act,” Obama recently told Time magazine. “I have tried to follow that same wisdom.”

Yet Katrina inspired a change of heart and within days Obama was giving his first nationally televised interviews. A tall, glamorous figure with a mesmerising speaking style, he has since popped up in public frequently and joined Clinton in voting against John Roberts as Bush’s choice for the new chief justice of the US Supreme Court.

For Clinton, Obama’s emergence represents both an opportunity and a potential longer-term threat. For much of the past five years she has been building bridges to the communities she needs for a successful White House run in 2008.

She has devoted herself to security issues and forged a strong relationship with the military. She has softened her stance on abortion, emphasising the human agonies involved, and worked hard to shed her reputation as a bruising ideologue by co-operating with Republican senators on a range of issues. She has backed Bush on keeping US troops in Iraq.

Yet Obama’s support — and his presumed influence with blacks and other poor immigrant communities — could be critical to Clinton’s success. Not the least of Senator John Kerry’s problems against Bush last year was his failure to mobilise black voters who traditionally support the Democrats.

So it was not just doctors’ eyebrows that were raised when Clinton and Obama announced last week they were working together to find a solution to America’s medical malpractice crisis.

So many lawsuits are filed against doctors that the cost of malpractice insurance is driving many of them out of business.

Ornstein noted that the announcement was likely to fan speculation about Obama’s vice-presidential prospects. “He’s got national candidacy written all over him,” he said.

Few Democrats believe America is ready for a presidential ticket comprising a woman with a black running mate — at least not in 2008. “That’s too much history all at once,” one party strategist said.

Yet there are signs that Obama is positioning himself to inherit Clinton’s mantle as the next great Democratic presidential hope should the New York senator slip in her Senate re-election campaign next year — or otherwise fall from the reckoning.

When Katrina struck, Obama was out of the country on his first foreign trip as a senator to inspect disarmament projects in Russia, Ukraine and Azerbaijan. On his way home he passed through London and paid a brief visit to No 10 and a meeting with Tony Blair.

“They let me sit in Winston Churchill’s reading chair,” he proudly told reporters later. One day visitors may be told it was also the chair used by President Obama.

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