(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-01-11 09:05

In a debate in New Hampshire, the New York senator said in comparing her ability and Obama's to fulfill pledges to bring about change: "I think it is clear that what we need is somebody who can deliver change. And we don't need to be raising the false hopes of our country about what can be delivered. The best way to know what change I will produce is to look at the changes that I've already made."

Returning to the subject, Obama said when he took the microphone from Kerry: "In the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope."

Obama supporters were hoping the timing of Kerry's endorsement could give him a lift as he seeks to put his New Hampshire primary loss behind him. Obama also picked up the endorsement of South Dakota Sen. Tim Johnson.

Obama praised Kerry's Vietnam War service, calling him a patriot and a man of conviction.

Kerry was Obama's political benefactor once before, selecting the relatively unknown Illinois senatorial candidate to deliver the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston. It was Obama's first turn in the national spotlight and helped launch him on a remarkable ascent that has made him one of two leading contenders for the party's presidential nomination only four years later.

Kerry had withheld his endorsement, hoping to have an impact on the race and avoid the fate of fellow Democrat Al Gore, the 2000 nominee who endorsed Howard Dean in 2004 shortly before the former Vermont governor's campaign imploded. Gore has made no endorsement so far this year.

While Kerry has been close to Clinton's husband, the former president, he was incensed in 2006 when she chided him after Kerry suggested that people who don't go to school "get stuck in Iraq." Aides said Kerry meant to jab at Bush and say "get us stuck in Iraq," and that he didn't appreciate Clinton piling onto the criticism he was already getting for the remark.

Kerry's own hopes to run for president this year fizzled with that botched comment. For many Democrats, his words revived bitter memories of his missteps in 2004. troop withdrawal deadlines. In another area, he has backed environmental causes, writing a book with his wife on the issue.

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