ONE OF US:

Now many liberals feel sure: Barack Obama was not the one they'd been waiting for.

The man who won the presidency in part due to his opposition to the Iraq War was suddenly leading a charge to use military force against the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad. The Republican refusal to go along was to be expected. The liberal backlash, though, was particularly intense.

That came on top of the fears that the president will, for all the current tough rhetoric, again go into the fall political fights about the budget and debt ceiling starting from a position of over-concession.

The White House says he's still a proud progressive. And, of course, he'll always be a socialist to the Republican base. To prominent liberals, though, Obama's center-left, sure. But he's no liberal.

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