While Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are locked in combat for the Democratic party’s presidential nomination, commentary on the front-running Mr Obama’s policy agenda, especially on trade, has become faintly ludicrous.

On the one hand, David Wessel declared in the Wall Street Journal recently, as others have, that the two had no disagreements on trade policy. On the other hand, Mrs Clinton has assaulted Mr Obama for having no policy agenda at all, a charge that John McCain, the Republican frontrunner, has eagerly embraced. Both views are wrong. Mr Obama has specifics and they differ in important respects from those offered by Mrs Clinton.