If there was candidate in this year's US mid-term elections whose popularity was put to the test, then it was Democratic Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, wife of former president Bill Clinton. She was not only fighting for re-election as New York's senator, but it is known that she intends running for the White House in 2008.

As a former First Lady, just this contemplation has attracted a great deal of media attention. Mrs Clinton passed the litmus test by defeating Republican challenger John Spencer with a landslide margin of 67% against 30%. Theoretically, her re-election is the beginning of her presidential campaign; a sentiment that could be deduced from the address she gave to the crowd celebrating her victory.

"Last week, the Vice-President said, 'Regardless of the outcome, the administration would go 'full speed ahead' in the same direction,'" Clinton told the boisterous crowd of supporters in New York. "Well, I think that the American people have said, 'Not so fast.'" Spencer conceded defeat, and praised Clinton for what he termed a "key victory". He blamed his defeat on lack of sufficient funds, "We didn't have the gunpowder, which was tens of millions of dollars to back up our message," said Spencer.

Mrs. Clinton currently remains the most active of the US First Ladies in politics, even as First Lady she wielded much political influence and exercised enormous informal powers in the White House throughout her husband's two terms. This was due to her exceptional intellectual ability and legal background, as a former lawyer; she was even amusingly nicknamed by some American press as "Vice-President Hillary Clinton".

She was credited, for example, with assisting in the adoption of many liberal policies in government, such as recruitment and healthcare, and in the appointment of liberal thinkers and women into high offices. Mrs Clinton set her political opinions straight from the very beginning of her husband's mandate, although, constitutionally, the President's wife has no official role.

This is far from the truth, when you take into account her intellectual abilities, charisma, seductive ability or charm, all qualities which a First Lady can always judiciously use to attract an enormous amount of support and sympathy for a cause of action which she wants the government to support. Mrs. Clinton did just that.

Beyond her husband's mandate, she also has her own political ambitions of which to take care. At the close of her husband's presidential mandate in 2000, she ran for the post of senator in the State of New York and won, thereby becoming the first-ever First Lady to contest an elected post. She also became the first and only woman to be elected to the U.S. Senate from the State of New York.

However, her political ambitions were nowhere near complete. Instead, the confident Mrs. Clinton is dreaming of higher political office. Her eyes are now set on the White House and, to clear any doubts concerning whether or not she will actually be running, Matt Bennett, a former Bill Clinton White House staffer, said after Hillary's victory, "She's going to run and everybody knows it...she doesn't even need to make a formal announcement."

As one of the most influential people in Congress, no one doubts that a Clinton may soon be back in the White House, but not without stakes. The Democratic ticket may not be an easy one to win. Already, Senator Barack Obama, US senator for Illinois and another key figure, has announced his intention of joining the contest.