We’ve always thought that political leadership could be measured in how a President laid out specific plans and convinced Congress to support him. John F. Kennedy showed that kind of leadership when he authored a bold mission for space exploration by challenging America to go to the Moon, after the demoralization of Sputnik. Harry Truman rescued western Europe with the Marshall Plan. Ronald Reagan won the Cold War by beating the Soviets both militarily and economically, as Reagan had predicted. Even the oft-maligned Richard Nixon opened China to the US.

Of course, we’ve come to expect much less from Barack Obama, whose two signature programs — ObamaCare and Porkulus — got outsourced to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. Now that the debt ceiling is about to cause Treasury to choke on both, Obama insists that this is an unparalleled fiscal crisis for the nation, one that requires leadership. Obama has even gone to the press four times in the last three weeks insisting that America needs leadership more now than ever — and that Congress ought to provide it. Jake Tapper asked Jay Carney why Obama hasn’t demonstrated some leadership himself as President by presenting a specific plan to deal with the crisis, and that left Carney attempting to define leadership as, er, not leading:

Leadership is not proposing a plan for the sake of having it voted up or down, and likely voted down because it is — look, you know how this town works and how Congress works.

Yeah, and that’s a pretty good explanation of how Obama works.

Got an Obamateurism of the Day? If you see a foul-up by Barack Obama, e-mail it to me at [email protected] with the quote and the link to the Obamateurism. I’ll post the best Obamateurisms on a daily basis, depending on how many I receive. Include a link to your blog, and I’ll give some link love as well. And unlike Slate, I promise to end the feature when Barack Obama leaves office.

Illustrations by Chris Muir of Day by Day. Be sure to read the adventures of Sam, Zed, Damon, and Jan every day!