by David Safier
Here's a quote every Democrat playing duck-and-delay games with health care legislation should keep in mind.
Republican Senator Jim DeMint said if they can delay health care legislation until September, they can kill it.
DeMint is probably overstating the case, but if one of Obama's signature issues goes down in flames, it will do serious damage to his presidency.
During the Clinton administration, Gingrich feared a Democratic health
care bill. He saw that as a way for Democrats to cement their majority, so he knew he had to pull out all the stops to defeat it.
There are two sides to the DeMint coin. On one side, a defeat for health care legislation is a defeat for Obama and, by extension, for all Dems in Congress. On the other side, passing strong legislation will be a huge victory that will benefit Democrats everywhere. That's a cynical, political way of framing the issue, but maybe that's the kind of framing it will take for some Democrats to get on board.
It makes my heart sink to see a letter like this urging a delay of the legislation.