Another link from Gaius: David Sirota critiques the hype about a 2008 Barack Obama presidential run. Coming from the progressive Left, Sirota points out that Obama has essentially no record of willingness to take the lead on any controversial issue. Sirota doesn’t blame Obama himself as much as the people for whom he’s become a kind of cipher for progressive ambitions.

I’ve noticed the same phenomenon among some left-leaning Christians who seem to see Obama as the ideal standard bearer for a center-Left Christian progressivism. But with essentially no legislative record to speak of, it’s hard to see why that should be. A couple of good high-profile speeches and a willingness to say positive things about “faith” seem to have been sufficient to garner this widespread adoration.