That’s a point I made in a 2008 column:

… the glorious nothing that comprises the substance of Obama’s speeches. When Obama speaks, he tells of an elevated nothing. The Democrat frontrunner lifts his eyes, raises his voice, and describes a visionary nothing. At the peak of his oration, Obama resounds a thunderous nothing. When the senator from Illinois is on the stump, the crowd gasps, the women swoon, and even the stoic catch their breaths and exclaim, “Now that is nothing!”

It is a nothing rarefied in the elixir of our hopes and distilled with our zest for change. It is as intoxicating a nothing as ever there was. Obama pours out potent nothing, and each listener gives it his own special something.

With now President Obama’s inability to articulate something to do with major world events, our European allies have awoken to the void in American leadership. Obama’s oftmocked reliance on teleprompters and his ludicrous parade of failed Very Important Speeches on Obamacare show how much stock he puts in his ability read aloud, but if his is a Hamlet presidency, all he has given us so far is “Words, words, words.”

In the (UK) Daily Express:

What is President Obama doing about anything? The most alarming answer – your guess is as good as mine – is also, frankly, the most accurate one. What the President is not doing is being clear, resolute and pro-active, which is surely a big part of his job description. This is what he has to say about the popular uprising in Libya: “Gaddafi must go.” At least, that was his position on March 3.

Since then, other countries – most notably Britain and France – have been calling for some kind of intervention. Even the Arab League, a notoriously conservative organisation, has declared support for sanctions. But from the White House has come only the blah-blah of bland statements filled with meaningless expressions and vague phrases. Of decisive action and leadership – even of clearly defined opinion – there is precious little sign.

Or, as Dennis Miller put it, “Sometimes Obama is so reticent to engage he makes Godot look like the first guy in line at the Day After Thanksgiving Day Sale at Target.”