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“YOU'RE all 70 years younger than I am!” exclaims Studs Terkel, a 91-year-old writer and Chicago legend, looking wistfully at the crowd gathered round him at Sedgwick's, a yuppie bar on the city's north side. He is introducing Barack Obama, a Democrat running for the Senate. Personal fortunes are being lavishly spent ahead of the Illinois primary on March 16th, but the Obama fundraiser is a low-budget affair, with attendees paying $50 each to rub shoulders with Mr Terkel, eat pizza, and hear Mr Obama say that “ordinary people can do extraordinary things when they're given an opportunity.”

Mr Obama hopes to prove that money is not everything. Among the eight Illinois Democrats and seven Republicans campaigning to replace Peter Fitzgerald, the one-term Republican senator who is retiring, at least six have net worths of $1m or more. Mr Obama, a state legislator and law-school lecturer, is not one of them. Yet a statewide poll of likely voters released on March 8th shows that Mr Obama—whose district includes some of the richest and poorest areas in Chicago—is moving into the Democrats' top spot.

United States US Election 2004 Barack Obama, Blair Hull, Dan Hynes, Jack Ryan

The Illinois Senate race is getting a lot of national attention because it represents “a huge pick-up opportunity” for the Democrats in the Republican-controlled Senate, says David Wilhelm, a former head of the Democratic National Committee who is running John Kerry's presidential campaign in the state. Most punters put their money on Jack Ryan, an investment banker-turned-teacher, to snatch the Republican nomination: he is rich, telegenic, and wins applause for having left a job at Goldman Sachs to teach at an all-black high school on Chicago's south side. The Democratic race is harder to guess.

Three men appear to have a good shot at the nomination: Mr Obama, Blair Hull, a former securities trader, and Dan Hynes, the state comptroller. They are separated more by their money, connections and experience than by their positions on issues, which are really much of a muchness.

Mr Hull, a first-time candidate who made his fortune, estimated at over $400m, playing blackjack and trading securities, has spent extravagantly on advertising, the only Democrat to mount a full-blown campaign across the state. He was the party front-runner in opinion polls a month ago, but his support has slipped in recent weeks after the disclosure of messy details about his divorce.

This being Chicago, there is also a “machine” candidate: Mr Hynes, who comes from a politically influential family. His father is a former president of the state Senate who still represents one of Chicago's wards. His bid has tacit support from Mayor Richard Daley, a political powerbroker. Given all the faithful foot-soldiers who are bound to turn out for him, Mr Hynes would benefit from a generally low turnout—which could happen, now that the presidential primary is essentially decided.

Then there is Mr Obama, whose brains and accomplishments have earned him endorsements from Chicago's two leading daily papers. His record is impressive: he was the first African-American (his father is black, his mother white) to head the Harvard Law Review, he was a civil-rights lawyer and has been an active state senator. But he faces a number of difficulties.

For a start, the liberal vote could be split between several candidates. Worse, he has had too little money to run many advertisements downstate, though there is a chance that his ties to the late Paul Simon, a long-serving liberal senator from that region, could help. He has worked hard to reach across racial lines, but his core support comes from blacks and white urban progressives, and he has pinned his primary hopes largely on the Chicago area.

Then there is his unusual name: “I've been called Alabama and Yo, mama,” he jokes. He grew up in Indonesia and Hawaii, and admits that he is “pretty exotic for a political candidate”. Are Illinois voters ready for this? In a city with deep Irish roots, a local commentator suggests that he might do better as O'Bama.