He may not feel it on the eve of what is likely to be a wretched mid-term election for his party, but Barack Obama is a lucky man. The new boy from Illinois who joined the Senate in 2005 cannot have expected to become president in less than four years. Though not lacking in self-belief, he thought his chance would come later. But within a year, Pete Rouse, his chief of staff, urged him quietly to lay plans for a presidential run in 2008, just in case "a perfect storm" gave him an opening.
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