'I Feel Change in the Air,' Says Kennedy of Obama

It was as close as it gets to a coronation. In front of a rapturous, chanting crowd, Ted Kennedy today enfolded Barack Obama into a hug, and in that instant drew a clear line of succession from the Democratic heroes of the past to a younger generation.

Now it was official: Obama was the rightful political heir to John F Kennedy as designated by his brother, Ted, his daughter, Caroline, and his nephew, Patrick.

"I feel change in the air," Ted Kennedy roared, and the crowd roared with him.

For Obama's followers, the blessing from Kennedy, a champion of liberal causes, reaffirms their conviction that they are part of an historic change.

It was a sentiment Kennedy invoked repeatedly as he described how the young senator reminded him of his late brother.

"As John Kennedy said, the world is changing. The old ways will not do. It is time for a new generation of leadership," he said.

Even his booming oratory was repeatedly drowned out by a crowd that easily topped 6,000. The line to get into today's rally stretched well outside the campus of Washington's American University, and snaked up the hill for a quarter of a mile. Inside the packed auditorium, people waited nearly two hours for Kennedy and Obama to make their entrance.

Most of those were not even born during Kennedy's brief presidency. Even Obama admitted: "I was too young to remember John Kennedy. I was just a child when Robert Kennedy was running for president."

But there was a smattering of people for whom the connection with Kennedy was deeply personal.

"We've been waiting for someone we can care about," said Barbara Franklin, 69, and a retired labor lawyer who moved to Washington in 1961 in an earlier burst of idealism. "We have been feeling since the beginning of his campaign that he is someone like John F Kennedy who can inspire a young generation to come to Washington like we were inspired. John F Kennedy brought a lot of us to Washington because we wanted to be in public service."

The Clinton campaign produced its own Kennedy supporters: Kathleen Kerry Townsend, a former lieutenant governor of Maryland, and the daughter of Bobby Kennedy, as well as her sister, Kerry. "I respect Caroline and Teddy's decision but I have made a different choice," Townsend said.

But there was no way to match the huge boost to Obama's prestige of an endorsement from so towering figure as Ted Kennedy. With his family history and his 45 years in the Senate, Kennedy comes second only to Bill Clinton in the Democratic pantheon.

Kennedy's endorsement makes Obama the unofficial candidate of the liberal wing of the Democratic party. It is also a personal rebuff to both Clintons, who have a longer relationship with Kennedy than Obama. Hillary Clinton had worked in the Senate with Kennedy on healthcare and education; the two families have gone sailing together at Cape Cod. However, Obama courted Kennedy as well, asking his advice more than a year ago over whether he should seek the presidency. Kennedy reportedly said yes.

But the elder statesman of the Democratic party had stayed on the sidelines - despite fervent appeals for his support from both camps - until after the Iowa caucuses when he was impressed by Obama's ability to carry one of America's whitest states.

He was also increasingly angered by the tenor of the campaign in South Carolina when the Clintons formed a tag team to attack Obama. Kennedy telephoned the former president to complain about the attempts to marginalize Obama as an African-American candidate.

That anger at the Clintons came through clearly in the arena today as Kennedy railed against the cynicism and hard elbowed style of politics.

"We will turn the page on the old politics of misrepresentation and distortion," Kennedy yelled. "With Barack Obama we will close the books on the old politics of race against race gender against gender."

Kennedy intends to follow up today's meeting by campaigning aggressively on his behalf in the south-west, where his record on immigration reform could give Obama much-needed hope among Latino voters.