Last month, when he spoke at Cooper Union in New York City and decried the "battalions of financial industry lobbyists descending on Capitol Hill" to weaken or kill the financial reform legislation now being debated in the Senate, Obama named no names and did what politicians often do when they describe how special interests game Washington: He stayed vague. A week later, as Senate Republicans were threatening to block the Wall Street reform measure from reaching a vote, I asked press secretary Robert Gibbs if the White House believed the GOP was in league with Wall Street to thwart the bill. Gibbs wouldn't take the bait. "You know where the president stands on moving forward with this legislation," he said. That is, he passed up the chance to rail against the GOP for being the handmaidens of Big Finance. For weeks, Obama had implied that, but Gibbs wouldn't even go that far. Of course, real populists don't imply.

Thursday offered a good encapsulation of the Obama populism pirouette. Republicans were pushing an amendment that would weaken the financial reform bill provision setting up an independent consumer financial protection bureau (which will pursue banks, credit card companies, mortgage lenders and other firms that try to rip off consumers). And that morning, Obama issued a statement denouncing the GOPers: "I will not allow amendments like this one written by Wall Street's lobbyists to pass for reform."

Here was Obama explicitly accusing Republicans of fronting for the Big Banks. It was a serious charge: GOP senators allowing Wall Street influence-peddlers to draft legislation for them. At the White House press briefing later that day, the administration defended this accusation. When CBS News' Chip Reid asked "what evidence is there" that Wall Street lobbyists crafted this amendment, Deputy Treasury Secretary Neal Wolin, who was making a special cameo appearance, replied, "I think [Wall Street] lobbyists have been chipping away, frankly, all the way through. And this [Republican] alternative, I think, reflects a lot of the themes that you've seen from them, from their trade associations, from the [Chamber of Commerce] and so forth." The Washington Times' Kara Rowland noted that this allegation was "pretty harsh," and Gibbs shot back, "I'll send you the [news] clip from the Republicans calling the lobbyists up to Capitol Hill in order to kill the financial reform bill."

The Obama White House was being about as populist as it gets. (The GOP substitute later lost on a 61-to-38 vote, with two Republicans voting against it.) Yet at the same briefing, Wolin also batted down the populist amendments sought by Senate progressives. For instance, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) had proposed regular audits of the Federal Reserve. "We oppose the Sanders amendment," Wolin declared, noting that it could interfere with the secretive Fed's independence. (Hours later, the administration cut a deal with Sanders. He narrowed his proposal to a one-time audit of the Fed, and the White House blessed this.)

Wolin also declined to say whether the administration backs an amendment proposed by Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) to force supersized banks out of the risky derivatives business. And I asked Wolin if the administration would support what was perhaps the most populist amendment then pending -- a provision authored by Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Sen. Ted Kaufman (D-Del.) to place limits on the size of mega-banks so that if one failed it would not pull down the entire financial system. No way, Wolin said. He noted that the White House shared these senators' concern "about the riskiness of certain institutions." (The measure essentially targeted the six largest banks -- Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.) But Wolin added, "Size is not, I think, the single attribute that we feel should be focused on." (Later in the day, the amendment failed on a 61-to-33 vote.)

So on the populist-o-meter, Obama had a mixed day. He accused the GOPers of pimping for Big Finance. But he essentially said no to three populist measures designed to undercut the power and reach of the Fed and the big banks. All in all, not so bad for the plutocrats of Wall Street.