At the Democratic National Convention in September, Michelle Obama told the crowd, "Being president doesn't change who you are, it reveals who you are."

Many Americans have spent the past four years waiting for that reveal, and now that Barack Obama has won a second term, they will have a chance to find out. While Obama has been famously pragmatic, many wonder to what end. Is he a true progressive, a Blue Dog fiscal conservative, or perhaps a centrist in the Clinton mold?

Michael Grunwald, the author of a new book that deconstructs the massive stimulus bill, argued convincingly in a recent Atlantic essay that President Obama made sizable progressive changes in the early part of his term by using an insider political strategy.