that thus far he appears to be a pragmatic opportunist, in a somewhat more positive sense of the latter word than is usually intended. He skews centrist when the support for more dramatic actions is limited, but when there is agreement or an opening, he will pursue more significant changes in direction.

The health-care plan, unfortunately, is an example - his approach has been that of a centrist. He put out a few general principles, and then left the details up to the congressional sausage-making machine. That's not the modus operandi of any kind of radical revolutionary, but rather the guy who is looking to get the community to agree on better times and methods of garbage pickup. Alas, this kind of tinkering at the edges is not really going to be sufficient to fix the healthcare mess - this is an instance where it would have been nice to have an FDR-style leader, to gradually bring Americans to a willingness to take action they would have considered untenable before.