Candidate Jimmy Carter said yes on the campaign trail, but history remembers his actual presidential administration with much more of a gimlet eye. And President Obama is having more than a few Carteresque moments of his own.

Found via Steve Green’s weekly roundup of Blogs at PJTV.com, Barbara Curtis writes:

On Tuesday, as press secretary Gibbs fielded questions from the press regarding Daschle’s dropping out as HHS secretary, Obama and Michelle “escaped” to read a book to second graders at a DC public school:

[Click for video]

There’s certainly the irony that his own girls are going to the most elite school in DC while the Obamas grandstand among the common kids in a public school.

But ponder the significance of a man who spent only several months in the Senate and then campaigned for almost two years to get to the White House, who now spends two weeks flubbing administratively while entertaining lavishly, then together with his wife acts like it’s such a terrible burden they have to “cut loose” and “break out.”

And just imagine if Bush had done something similarly shallow in the midst of constantly crying “Crisis!” to the citizens of this country.

“Who is this guy? Where is the Barack Obama who charmed the country and challenged it to greatness?” is New York Daily News columnist Michael Goodwin’s cri de coeur.

Over at his American Spectator blog, Robert Stacy McCain responds:

Campaigning is tough, but governing is infinitely harder. Remember when first Hillary Clinton, and then Republicans, tried to point out that Obama had no executive experience, had never really shown leadership in his legislative jobs, et cetera? Now his deficiencies are hurting him every day. The White House has many advantages, but it’s not a very good place to hide.

Orrin Judd looks into distance and observes: “Somewhere, a killer rabbit licks its chops.”