A year ago, Americans thought Democrat candidate Barack Obama was qualified to be president because of his alleged superior intellect and judgment. In the past nine months, Mr. Obama has shown Americans that he has neither; that he is a publicity-seeking dilettante who has trouble with facts and priorities.

Mr. Obama thrives on the adulations of liberals and foreigners—especially when he decries with the arrogance of a self-appointed demi-god—what he calls America’s moral failures, namely, denying constitutional rights to terrorists. One of his first executive orders was the closing of Guantanamo Bay. He repeated that commitment before the United Nations on September 23 and gave it a moralistic overtone. Yet, within days, his administration had to admit that it did not know how to close Gitmo; so much for Mr. Obama’s moral imperative.

The announced closing of Gitmo, with much fanfare but without a plan, constitutes a shocking display of incompetence. And there is mounting evidence that it reflects Mr. Obama’s approach to policy-making. Mr. Obama is given to, and excels at, theatrical rhetoric, but his pronouncements have been mostly devoid of substance.

Mr. Obama invested as much thinking in healthcare reform as he did in the Gitmo closing. It is now obvious that he never had a healthcare reform plan. The key issue of his campaign was merely a slogan and it remains undefined nine months after he took office. Vague speeches about healthcare reform do not constitute reform; they are just empty rhetoric.

Americans witnessed the same approach with the Obama stimulus plan. Then, the empty rhetoric was about 3.5 million jobs. These jobs have proven as elusive as the Gitmo closing. We explained in these pages (“Obama’s bogus economics,” April 2009) how the stimulus jobs were fabricated by an economic model designed to deliver pre-ordained results.

The Obama competence gap–the difference between his rhetoric and the reality–is significant; it is increasing; and it is increasingly worrisome. It suggests both confusion and an inability to prioritize and execute. But Americans should not be surprised. The competence gap was predictable.

Mr. Obama is as confused as candidate Obama was secretive about his qualifications, or lack thereof.

No responsible organization would hire an inexperienced executive without first reviewing his academic records. But Americans elected a candidate promoted as an intellectual goliath without finding out how well, or badly, he did in university a few years earlier. Americans were so impressed with Mr. Obama’s one-year presidency of the Harvard Law Review that they did not demand to see his Harvard Law School transcripts.

The media and the Obama campaign promoted Mr. Obama as immensely more intelligent than George W. Bush whom Democrats treated like the village idiot. Yet, Mr. Bush did release his university transcripts whereas Mr. Obama, the intellectual colossus, did not. Non-disclosure of relevant facts is always motivated by the need to hide those facts. One can only conclude that Mr. Obama’s transcripts would have been embarrassing and would have obliterated the claim of his superior intellect. And, without that claim, candidate Obama would have been left with only one qualification: his own claim of superior judgment.

Candidate Obama assured the American people that his lack of experience was more than offset by his superior judgment. That claim rests on a speech he made against the Iraq war when he was an Illinois state senator. Hilary Clinton thought it was a ridiculous claim.

Unless superior judgment also involves friendships with those who hate America, Mr. Obama’s association with Reverend Jeremiah Wright and William Ayers ought to have put that claim to rest. But Mr. Obama denied a close friendship with Ayers and Americans chose to believe him. Likewise, Mr. Obama assured Americans that he was unaware of Mr. Wright’s racist ranting and Americans took him at his word.

A new book by Christopher Andersen, "Barack and Michelle: Portrait of an American Marriage" is shedding light on Mr. Obama’s judgment and truthfulness. It looks like there is not much of either. Mr. Obama’s relationship with Ayers was much closer than Mr. Obama revealed during the campaign. Ayers and Obama were close friends and collaborated on each other’s books for several years.

These revelations contradict Mr. Obama’s statement about Ayers and cast doubts on Mr. Obama’s truthfulness. Did Mr. Obama lie to the American people about Mr. Wright as well? How could Mr. Obama not know about his preacher’s racist ranting? They were close friends for 20 years.

The problem with claiming that one has superior judgment is the arrogance required to make that claim. Arrogance is the enemy of wisdom. And Mr. Obama’s need for attention runs contrary to his presidential priorities. More than anything, Mr. Obama’s recent actions prove that his claim of superior judgment is bogus.

In a single day, on October 2, Mr. Obama paid more attention to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) than he had, over several months, to General Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan. At a critical time for the “war of necessity” in Afghanistan, the Commander in Chief’s greatest concern was the 2016 Summer Olympics.

Courting the IOC is beneath the dignity of the president of the United States, and a little digging into that organization would show why. But devoting more time to the unaccountable IOC aristocracy than to the Afghan war commander provides unassailable evidence that Mr. Obama does not understand the priorities of his job.

Mr. Obama delivers speeches well when he can read from a teleprompter. But in the first nine months of his administration, he has shown that his competence is questionable.

Hopefully, Americans have learnt that when a candidate to the presidency has no relevant experience, no proven leadership abilities, hides his academic records and refuses to provide a list of his law clients, and when he associates for years with questionable characters, including an unrepentant terrorist, that candidate is unfit for the Oval Office.