David Leonhardt's NYT op-ed is entirely correct in that:

1. The bill is not liberal but centrist/conservative and...

2. Obam never found a way to sell it...

This is the problem that Dems have had going back for decades... They talk too much... It doesn't much matter if they are right and advocating policies that would benefit the country it's just that they seem incapable of narrowing down their positions to fit on a bumper sticker... The Repubs have mastered the bumper sticker message and it shows... Here in this area of rural Virginia most of the folks can recite the bumper stickers... Try to engage them in conversation and they are totally incapable of explaining the positions at all but revert back to the bumper sticker, over and over and over...

This is why the Dems have failed...

Sellin' isn't running yer mouth... It's first listening, then trying feed back what you have heard in the fewest words to show that you are listening... Dems don't understand that concept...

If Obama had just said from the very beginning something like "We can't afford to spend 17% of our GNP on health care and be competetive enough to create new jobs" and just left it at that but say it over and over and over and have all the Dems in Congress say the same thing over and over until it was hammered into the pea-brains of the electorate he would have a bill by now... But no... He and the Dems couldn't stay on message... They have been like a football team where none of the player know what play was called... And it shows...

So... Not this time either, folks... Maybe in 2030... or 3030...or 4030???

B~