POLITICO: Reform Lite: Obama Goes Soft On Pork. “At times, he sounded more like a defender of the old ways than a critic.”

UPDATE: Real leadership in short supply: “Quite of few of President Obama’s supporters are completely bewildered, wondering where the ‘no earmarks’ promise went, feeling the sting of an administration wandering quickly to the left.”

ANOTHER UPDATE: Jake Tapper reminds us how Obama has changed his tune:

Candidate Obama said then “we can no longer accept a process that doles out earmarks based on a member of Congress’ seniority, rather than the merit of the project. We can no longer accept an earmarks process that has become so complicated to navigate that a municipality or non-profit group has to hire high-priced D.C. lobbyists to do it. And we can no longer accept an earmarks process in which many of the projects being funded fail to address the real needs of our country.”

Today, of course, President Obama will sign into law more than 8,000 earmarks for FY 2009, part of the $410 billion omnibus spending bill.

But he pledged to work with Congress to reform the earmark process.

In other words, “I’ll start my diet tomorrow.”