But if there were people at the Obama rally old enough to remember King, they were in a tiny minority. Whoever chose Washington Square as a venue must have wanted to send the message to television viewers that Obama attracts the young. The Square is slap-bang in the middle of New York University . . . a private university, feepaying , ranked the No.1 'dream school' in the States.

And the people massed under the trees of the park in the hot, muggy evening were overwhelmingly young and white, and this was a cheerful, slightly shambolic, student event . . . strangely inappropriate to Senator Obama who, in the debates between the Democratic party contenders for the position of presidential candidate comes across as an exceptionally sombre personality.

The kids cheered when a deeply unimpressive handful of minor local elected officials . . . men of colour, like Obama, but old-style politicos . . . were introduced. They cheered when a little girl read a letter she'd written asking Obama "to do something about the environment". They cheered when the African American actor Jeffrey Wright . . . oh where were his co-stars from Syriana? . . . proclaimed that "we are gathered today in support of the next president of the United States!" They wiggled their cellphones in the air when a rapper led them in a kind of middleclass version of a rap chant that had the refrain 'Take it to the Polls' But there was no breaking into dance. This audience was not, to put it mildly, street people.

These young people will become members of the educated class who make the American political system work . . . who "play the game, " as Obama put it contemptuously, "though what we need after Bush and Cheney is not a president who can play the game better but a president who changes the game." This was a dig at Hillary Clinton's insider expertise.

But is there an alternative to expertise? It wasn't possible to believe, on the strength of the Washington Square rally, that Obama is going to sweep America. It was like Croke Park, but not enough like it. Radical change needs passion, and there was more passion in one minute of Limerick v Waterford. "The American people are not the problem, " Obama intoned, and the kids cheered. . . "The American people are the solution!" More cheers. But for all the cheering, only Obama's wonderful voice made the things he said seem meaningful. Is there anywhere, anymore, where idealism sounds meaningful?

2008 PRIMARY CALENDAR

The 2008 primaries are stacked earlier than ever.

The traditionally early states kick it off, but most of the delegates to the parties' nominating conventions will be assigned on 5 February, which has been dubbed Super Duper Tuesday.

JANUARY

8 District of Columbia
14 Iowa
19 Nevada
22 New Hampshire, Wyoming (R)
29 South Carolina (D), Florida

FEBRUARY

2 South Carolina (R)
5 Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas, Utah
9 Louisiana
10 Maine (D)
12 Maryland, Virginia
19 Wisconsin
26 Hawaii (D)
Date TBC North Dakota

MARCH

2 Hawaii (R) 4Massachusetts, Ohio, Minnesota, Vermont
11 Mississippi 21Maine (R)

MAY

6 Indiana, North Carolina (may move to 5 Feb)
10 Wyoming (D)
13 Nebraska, West Virginia
20 Kentucky, Oregon
27 Idaho, Washington

JUNE

3 South Dakota

AUGUST

25-28 Democratic National Convention; Denver

SEPTEMBER

1-4 Republican National Convention; MinneapolisSt Paul

NOVEMBER

4 Election