You could call it a field of dashed dreams. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which convened today to consider Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state, is an object lesson on the soaring ambitions of America’s top politicians - and the often deflated realities of their achievements.

Like mother, like daughter.

“Her mother found her voice in New Hampshire, and Chelsea Clinton, has found hers too,” wrote Nikki Schwab of U.S. News & World Report in a story posted Tuesday on the magazine’s website.

The emergence of the 27-year-old daughter of presidential contender Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-NY, and former President Bill Clinton, as a campaign speaker represents a significant shift in the role of the former, and possibly future, first daughter.