“[House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi reportedly told liberal bloggers Monday that “nobody wants to vote for the Senate bill,” and so she’s strongly considering the non-vote vote.”

What?

A newly emerging Democratic plan to vote on health care reform without really voting on health care reform has critics riled up, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her allies are accused of resorting to legislative trickery to send a bill to President Obama’s desk.

Senate Democratic leaders had already drawn jeers from Republicans for a plan to try to pass a follow-up health bill with only 51 votes, as opposed to 60. Now Pelosi and Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., chairwoman of the House Rules Committee, are cooking up a plan to pass the original health bill from the Senate side without forcing rank-and-file Democrats to technically go on record in support of it.

What they’re brewing is unprecedented to this depth and breadth.

Here’s how the maneuver would work and why Pelosi wants it:

Before Congress can consider the package of changes that many lawmakers want in exchange for their support on the original bill, the House has to first pass the original bill from the Senate side.

Problem is, even with assurances that the package of changes will be considered, many House Democrats don’t want to go on record in support of the Senate bill — what with its sweetheart deals, tax on high-value insurance plans and other controversial provisions.

Enter the Pelosi tactic, known as a “self-executing rule.”

Under this tactic, the House could simultaneously approve the Senate version of the bill while voting on the package of changes. This would “deem” the Senate bill passed, though not directly show members voting in favor of passage.

How convenient. Just say it is so, and…it’s so.

It’s just so wrong.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. And everyone seems desperate this week….to either enshrine the Senate health care legislation into law, or to stop it. There’s a new sense of urgency, tension and drama. The stakes are huge, the consequences profound. Both sides seem to be laying everything on the line now.

The WSJ calls it an ‘Abuse of Power’, a ‘rendezvous with liberal destiny.’

What we are about to witness is an extraordinary abuse of traditional Senate rules to pass a bill merely because they think it’s good for the rest of us, and because they fear their chance to build a European welfare state may never come again…

Reconciliation is the last mathematical gasp for ObamaCare because Democrats can’t sell their policy to Senator [Olympia] Snowe, any other Republican, or even dozens of Democrats. This raw exercise of political power is of a piece with the copious corruption and bribery—such as the Cornhusker kickbacks and special tax benefits for union members—that liberals had to use to get even this far.

Suddenly, I recalled the clip from ‘Saving Private Ryan’ building toward the climax when the rumble of tanks could be heard and felt as an overwhelming force of menacing troops descended on the town in which Ryan and a handful of squad members were defending the pivotal bridge from enemy takeover, though they were terribly outnumbered and outgunned.

This feels like that kind of week, with the risk of exaggeration but only for purposes of emphasis.

The goal is to permanently expand the American entitlement state with a vast apparatus of subsidies and regulations while the political window is still (barely) open, regardless of the consequences or the overwhelming popular condemnation. As Mr. Obama fatalistically said after his health summit, if voters don’t like it, “then that’s what elections are for.”

In other words, he’s volunteering Democrats in Congress to march into the fixed bayonets so he can claim an LBJ-level legacy like the Great Society that will be nearly impossible to repeal. This would be an unprecedented act of partisan arrogance that would further mark Democrats as the party of liberal extremism. If they think political passions are bitter now, wait until they pass ObamaCare.

On a less lofty editorial level, pro-life media seeing the inevitable defeat of longstading  Hyde Amendment safeguards against abortion funding, and of conscience protection in health care, are calling the strategy ‘thuggery in Washington’.

All stops are being pulled to ram their health care legislation through – no matter how much the American public opposes it, no matter how much they have to lie and trash the constitution and legislative traditions, and no matter how much they have to bribe or threaten fellow Democrats who won’t go along with their corrupt program.

They’re going for broke.

And, of course, there has been an unprecedented willingness to ignore congressional rules -- from the failure to appoint a "conference committee" to negotiate differences between the House and Senate bills, to their current plans to use the reconciliation process to bypass a Republican filibuster.

Expect the tactics to get even dirtier now.

These are the times that try men’s souls, so  a Catholic bishop is calling for prayer and fasting.

“Catholic teaching tells us that our support for the dignity of life includes access to affordable health care. This support, however, cannot come at the expense of the respect for life at all stages, from natural conception to natural death,” wrote [Arlington Bishop Paul] Loverde in a letter posted on the diocesan website.

Democrat leaders in the House of Representatives currently face enormous pressure from the Senate and White House to pass the entire Senate health care bill, which contains numerous pro-abortion provisions and has been deemed by pro-life leaders “the biggest expansion of abortion since Roe v. Wade.” A House panel is expected to begin reviewing the Senate bill on Monday.

Loverde called for prayer and fasting from members of the diocese “as negotiations that are now underway could lead to further Congressional action [on health care] very soon.” The intention, said the bishop, would be “for protecting the life, dignity, health and conscience rights of every human person in any legislation that Congress considers.”

“I firmly believe that, working together while open to God’s wisdom, the citizens of our nation can respect the dignity of each human person both in law and in practice,” he wrote. “Through our fasting and prayers, we ask the Lord to lead the hearts and minds of our nation’s leaders as they make crucial decisions concerning the protection of life.”

Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput came out Monday with a strong statement against what he warns is dangerous extremism in the Senate’s ‘bad bill’.

The Senate version of health care reform currently being forced ahead by congressional leaders and the White House is a bad bill that will result in bad law. It does not deserve, nor does it have, the support of the Catholic bishops of our country… It does not meet minimum moral standards in at least three important areas: the exclusion of abortion funding and services; adequate conscience protections for health care professionals and institutions; and the inclusion of immigrants.

Two of those provisions align more closely with conservative Republicans, while the last one lines up more closely with liberal Democrats. For the bishops, it’s not about what’s politically correct, but what the Church holds as morally correct. And it’s plunging to a climax.

As we enter a critical week in the national health care debate, Catholics need to remember a few simple facts.

First, the Catholic bishops of the United States have pressed for real national health care reform in this country for more than half a century…

Second, the bishops have tried earnestly for more than seven months to work with elected officials to craft reform that would serve all Americans in a manner respecting minimum moral standards. The failure of their effort has one source. It comes entirely from the stubbornness and evasions of certain key congressional leaders, and the unwillingness of the White House to honor promises made by the president last September.

Third, the health care reform debate has never been merely a matter of party politics. Nor is it now. Democratic Congressman Bart Stupak and a number of his Democratic colleagues have shown extraordinary character in pushing for good health care reform while resisting attempts to poison it with abortion-related entitlements and other bad ideas that have nothing to do with real health care. Many Republicans share the goal of decent health care reform, even if their solutions would differ dramatically. To put it another way, few persons seriously oppose making adequate health services available for all Americans. But God, or the devil, is in the details—and by that measure, the current Senate version of health care reform is not merely defective, but also a dangerous mistake.

Barring something like a big cinematic heroic rescue, it is also about to become law.

The idea behind the interactive webcast program ’Bump’ was to follow three fictitious characters through unplanned pregnancies and invite viewers to debate and try to shape whatever decisions the three women came to about choosing abortion or not. It set out to be provocative, and it did provoke.

Now the web series has come to an end, and producers are encouraging more conversation. What to say…..?

It is certainly a unique cultural moment. From the beginning of the series, I’ve been receiving updates in my inbox regularly as I somehow landed on Yellow Line Studio’s mailing list as no doubt thousands of others have. And to borrow the phrase from Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink, I felt intuitive repulsion before thinking about it more, but have thought about it more. Especially when I saw the comments of a few people whose insights I value.

Matthew Archbold sized it up in his usual creatively pointed way, and I agree with much of what he said.

Here’s the thing. Very real abortions are procured for much more fatuous reasons than viewer votes on a game show. To many progressives, abortion just isn’t that big of a deal. And that’s going on in real life, never mind in a reality game show…

Right now, abortion as a cultural conversation is barely a whisper…When someone holds up a sign of a dismembered fetus in front of an abortion clinic people are outraged at the man holding the sign while ignoring the fact that abortionists are actually pulling apart real babies just inside the building. America is experiencing a silent holocaust. And let’s face it, silence only helps the status quo…

I’ll accept just about anything to stop the cultural blackout we have on all things abortion.

Fr. Frank Pavone says pretty much the same thing. He’s generous and open to this new venue for conversation.

“Bump+’s” target audience is not the pro-life community. It is trying to reach the vast number of citizens whose attitude toward abortion can best be described as conflicted. “Bump+” is not a forum for an abortion debate. The point here is to help viewers hear and feel both sides of the issue through stories. This is simply a conversation, not a condoning of abortion. We need to bring people through the conversation through stories. Jesus was a storyteller. You tell a story and let people connect with that…

The big benefit for people in the middle is that “Bump+” helps people get beyond the slogans. Slogans can contain a lot of truth and grace, but they can also shut down thinking. If you can get people beyond slogans, that is a big benefit.

That’s a good point. Slogans can shut down thinking.

On the pro-life side of the coin, we have to make sure that we’re not just articulating arguments, but that we can feel with those who are facing the decision and the temptations that lead one toward abortion. This doesn’t mean that the decision should be anything other than choosing life, but the more we understand them, the better we will be able to help them.

This is exactly what I’ve tried to say for a long time (but not as well or succinctly as Fr. Pavone). In order to engage, we need to both listen and speak, but for so long now we’ve mostly talked past each other. Conversions from the ‘pro-choice’ side to the pro-life have mostly been through traumatic firsthand experiences, which is why Silent No More Awareness Campaign is so effective at changing hearts and minds.

But that takes listening to people who regret participating in abortions, and the general ‘pro-choice’ population likely pay no attention to those people.

That’s why producers decided to make this series. ‘Bump the Show’s website encourages viewers to click on different characters and episodes and

add your voice to any discussion you choose. We’re looking for personal experiences, honest conversation, and compassionate advice for our characters. We’ve heard all the arguments on both sides of the issue. This is a place to share your stories and talk to each other, not at each other.

It’s a new direction and one the young adult generation is starting to take us in, through their eyes. And they see things differently from generations preceding them.

The Yellow Line Studios notice that showed up in my inbox today was intriguing. Here’s some of it:

During a final episode, set to premiere this Monday, March 15, 2010, members of the production team will address the thousands of viewers in sixty-four countries who have tuned in to watch the series. They will be joined by members of that viewing audience who have been an ongoing part of the accompanying discussion on the website. Guests currently scheduled to appear include Sister Mary Agnes Dombroski, a New Hampshire nun whose order operates a group home for abused children and created www.runningnuns.com; and Jennifer Filipowicz, a pro-choice blogger and mother of two known to other fans by the screen name SuperHappyJen.

It also quoted a statement by Yellow Line’s CEO:

“We’ve been attacked and praised by people on both sides of the debate – but when you read the posts from our audience members, it’s impossible to deny that a respectful, compassionate conversation about abortion has begun. That was our only goal, and we hope it continues on the BUMP+ website and elsewhere.”

As Matthew Archbold said, the more shows like Bump the better. Make people confront the realities of abortion.

And if this was one step too far I’m begging them to take two…

Give ‘em their game show. Let’s have it out. In public. Because i know if abortion is talked about, we win.

Hopefully, we all win.

Many thousands of women, organizations and NGOs descended on New York for the recent global checkup with the annual  ’Commission on the Status of Women’, with the Beijing conference as sort of a benchmark. It was heavy on the agenda of spreading access to abortion under the mantle of ‘reproductive rights’, but there was a large pro-life contingent there to stake claims that authentic dignity for women comes from true universal human rights….for all human beings.

C-Fam captures the atmosphere well in this report on the competing views of maternal health.

I also like the succinct statement on the Vatican Information Service by Archbishop Celestino Migliore, Holy See permanent observer to the United Nations, who addressed this convoluted sounding gathering:

the fifty-fourth session of the Economic and Social Council’s Commission on the Status of Women, which was meeting to discuss “Item 3: Follow-up to the Fourth World Conference on Women and to the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly entitled ‘Women 2000: gender equality, development and peace for the twenty-first century’”.

This is the kind of cumbersome official-speak we need to wade through to mine the gems of insight and wisdom contained within at least some of them. Archbishop Migliore had both. He said:

“From the successive interventions in these days, … it seems that the assessment is not entirely positive: It includes some light, but also many and disturbing shadows.

He went on to note some advancements in the status of women and improvement in their social conditions in the world at large, but he also noted women continue to suffer violence and abuse in many parts of the world. Don’t just necessarily think ‘underdeveloped’ world or places under repressive regimes in picturing that. Migliore zeroes in on the (sorry) inconvenient truth embedded in the modern feminist agenda through agencies like the UN.

Follow this closely:

“Achieving equality between women and men in education, employment, legal protection and social and political rights is considered in the context of gender equality. Yet the evidence shows that the handling of this concept … is proving increasingly ideologically driven, and actually delays the true advancement of women. Moreover, in recent official documents there are interpretations of gender that dissolve every specificity and complementarity between men and women. These theories will not change the nature of things but certainly are already blurring and hindering any serious and timely advancement on the recognition of the inherent dignity and rights of women”.

Spot on. Furthermore…

Archbishop Migliore stressed the fact that the final documents of international conferences and committees often “link the achievement of personal, social, economic and political rights to a notion of sexual and reproductive health and rights which is violent to unborn human life and is detrimental to the integral needs of women and men within society”.

Exactly. This is undeniably true, and needs to be said and heard and deliberated and embraced as a motivation for change.

“A solution respectful of the dignity of women does not allow us to bypass the right to motherhood, but commits us to promoting motherhood by investing in and improving local health systems and providing essential obstetrical services”, he said.

Reclaiming and protecting motherhood is an important goal for women’s progress and for the future of the world. No exaggeration.

“Fifteen years ago the Beijing Platform for Action proclaimed that women’s human rights are an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of universal human rights. This is key not only to understanding the inherent dignity of women and girls but also to making this a concrete reality around the world”, he concluded.

And, at least I believe, key to peace in it.

Suddenly, it seems, abortion is getting some serious, major and long overdue attention. And it’s coming along different fronts…

Of all the many things people and politicians have against the Senate’s (and Obama’s) version of health care legislation, abortion has risen to the front as a (or the) potential final breach. They’re noticing that even across the pond, as the Economist says “It could all come down to abortion.”

That same paper did a cover story last week titled “Gendercide” which highlighted ’the war on baby girls’. Leaving aside their qualified support of legal abortion, even that newspaper’s editors see the appalling effects of targeted baby deaths in some countries.

China alone stands to have as many unmarried young men—“bare branches”, as they are known—as the entire population of young men in America. In any country rootless young males spell trouble; in Asian societies, where marriage and children are the recognised routes into society, single men are almost like outlaws. Crime rates, bride trafficking, sexual violence, even female suicide rates are all rising and will rise further as the lopsided generations reach their maturity…

It is no exaggeration to call this gendercide. Women are missing in their millions—aborted, killed, neglected to death. In 1990 an Indian economist, Amartya Sen, put the number at 100m; the toll is higher now.

So they set about suggesting changes the world needs to make to prevent such horrific undervaluing of a whole class of human beings.

Why can’t they see the obvious? When we deem an entire class of human beings unworthy of life if their mothers decide against giving birth (or someone forces them to abort), how can anyone make a reasoned and logical argument that some of that class should be more protected?

That’s what some black leaders are asking.

“And yet today, half of all black children are aborted. Half of all black children are aborted,”  [Congressman Trent] Franks says. “Far more of the African American community is being devastated by the policies of today than were being devastated by policies of slavery. And I think, What does it take to get us to wake up?”

A good point, and the right question.

Day Gardner, the president of the National Black Pro-Life Union, says he is right on track.

“Face it America, he’s right. Abortion has exacted a greater toll on blacks than slavery,” she told LifeNews.com.

“Our country brutally enslaved four million people, denying them their rights, their freedom and many times their lives. Rep. Franks is simply comparing that horrific truth to another horrific truth — which is that abortion has killed more than 17 million black people,” Gardner said.

“Slavery is a terrible stain on the fabric of America that can never be fully washed away,” the black pro-life leader continued. “The stain of abortion is every bit as terrible and even more atrocious than slavery in light of the fact that the victims of abortion are totally helpless–they are unable to run away, unable hide or defend themselves.”

Gardner calls the “devastation of abortion in the black community” a “hard truth” and she says “Franks and other members of Congress stand with us to right this terrible wrong.”

Congressman Bart Stupak and his pro-life bloc in the House are doing all they can.

The Supreme Court being a usually quietly deliberative body, couldn’t exactly hold press conferences after President Obama made unprecedented (and unpresidential) remarks harshly rebuking the High Court in Obama’s last SOTU address. The most we got was a camera shot of Justice Samuel Alito silently shaking his head and mouthing the words ‘not true’. But now, after due diligence, Chief Justice Roberts is talking, and taking Obama to task.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. told law students Tuesday that he found it “very troubling” to be surrounded by loudly cheering critics at President Obama’s State of the Union address, saying it was reason enough for the justices not to attend the annual speech to Congress.

“To the extent the State of the Union has degenerated into a political pep rally, I’m not sure why we are there,” Roberts said at the University of Alabama School of Law.

Two good points right there. Decorum and protocol are not being followed by this president and this White House. But the justice still hold to theirs, leaving them sitting silently watching and listening to members of Congress stand and cheer and holler in tasteless partisan support of Obama’s undignified swipe at the court.

The White House reportedly responded to Chief Justice Roberts’ remarks. But they really didn’t.

The White House fired back Tuesday night with a statement that did not address the substance of Roberts’s comments but with another broadside at the court’s decision in Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission. Press secretary Robert Gibbs accused the court of opening “the floodgates for corporations and special interests to pour money into elections — drowning out the voices of average Americans.”

….

The quick response by the White House to Roberts’s comments was striking.

The nature of it…par for the course. It seemed we didn’t get the change promised when this president ran as a candidate for office, since Washington has been as bitter and divided as ever. But it’s worse than ‘politics as usual’ when the president dressed down the Supreme Court in such a stately and historical setting.

Roberts commented that the whole process of seating justices on the court these days is broken.

Roberts also took issue with the Senate’s confirmation process for judges and justices, saying it is contentious and unproductive.

“I think the process is broken down,” he said. “The only people who can change it are the senators. I hope they do.”

Not looking good with this particular class. They’re the ones – at least of the majority party – who constituted the pep rally razzing the justices. The only people who can change that are the voters.

The pro-life movement has been as adaptable as it has been enduring. When Chicago passed the insidious ‘bubble zone’ ordinance, politicians not only denied citizens their free speech rights, they robbed women of their right to have a true choice when facing a challenging pregnancy. But pro-lifers found a simple, legal and tasteful way to silently offer women aid.

The no-choice movement found a way to yank even that. Not surprisingly, it was with the help of Chicago politicians. Dennis Byrne has the goods on how it went down. It involves

…a sign posted a few feet outside a North Side abortion clinic, offering women in difficult, unplanned pregnancies a different, life-affirming alternative.

Now this wasn’t just a crude, hand-painted sign. It was a fancy backlit sign, costing thousands to create and display. It took up the entire side of an empty “periodical stand” similar to those French-looking bus shelters and other “street furniture” that [Mayor Richard] Daley so loves.

It was contracted by a pregnancy help center, Aid for Women. And it has suddenly vanished.

But it wasn’t just the sign that vanished. The entire structure (what we used to call a newsstand) was gone too. It seemingly vaporized just 10 days after the sign went up Feb. 9, even though the advertiser, Aid for Woman, contracted to have it displayed until May 3.

Someone must have really wanted the sign gone. But who?

Trick question. This is Chicago.

Aid for Women…took out the ad to promote its alternative counseling, education and other assistance programs to pregnant women entering the Planned Parenthood clinic at LaSalle Drive and Division Street. Aid for Women offers the same caring attention to troubled women that abortion clinics say they provide — except for abortions and the pro-choice spin.

Some folks will automatically assume that the sign had one of those pro-life images that feature grisly pictures of aborted fetuses. It didn’t. In fact, it was a stylish graphic picturing a contemplative, distressed woman with the words, “Unplanned pregnancy? What now?” Printed below was contact information for Aid for Women. That’s it.

How threatening to the ‘choice’ movement. But such a simple message is all the pro-life movement’s got at this point, though it’s still a presence. The city’s controversial “bubble ordinance” so restricts free speech, even the ACLU opposed it as an infringement of civil rights, for crying out loud.

But this is Chicago politics, where the rules are different. The ward alderman who sponsored the ‘bubble ordinance’ just happens to be (surprise) the same one implicated in the disappearance of this sign. No one is talking. But the Thomas More Society law center is investigating who ordered the removal of the whole structure that regularly displays advertising, and held this Aid for Women message.

If the city ordered the sign removed because of its content, it has a serious constitutional problem on its hands. Stay tuned.

Judges, legislators and activists are tangling with some interesting back-and-forth attempts to regulate the abortion industry in Oklahoma and give women an informed choice…..or not.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court has declared that an Oklahoma law regulating abortion practice and requiring ultrasounds for women seeking abortion violated the state constitution’s single-subject rule, saying it contained multiple subjects for legislation.

The high court struck down SB 1878, upholding the August 2009 decision of Oklahoma County Judge Vicki Robertson, who ruled the multiple legislative mandates in the law required separate bills to pass constitutional muster.

OK, let’s untangle this…

Sounds like abortion backers won on a technicality, and they did.

The abortion law required abortionists to perform an ultrasound within an hour before the abortion procedure, and established the right of women to engage in civil action against abortionists who violated the law.

Excellent provision for women’s rights to information about their pregnancy before terminating it.

The law also required abortion clinics to have a notice prominently displayed in plain view declaring that: “it is against the law for anyone, regardless of his or her relationship to you, to force you to have an abortion.  By law, we cannot perform, induce, prescribe for, or provide you with the means for an abortion unless we have your freely given and voluntary consent.  …  You have the right to contact any local or state law enforcement agency to receive protection from any actual or threatened physical abuse or violence.”

Good, solid and vital information necessary for women’s rights to protection and the real freedom of choice (for crying out loud).

The law also regulated the prescribing of RU-486, dealt with informed consent, and established rules banning “wrongful birth” lawsuits.

This was all about protecting women, their rights, and the ability to make a choice based on information of all options and consequences. Who in the world (OK, in the state), was against that?

The abortion industry, of course. And those ideologically aligned with them.

So the judge said those provisions of the law were separate ones rolled into one, and you can’t do that, and therefore the law was struck down in toto.

Attorneys for the state argued that the bill was constitutional because it addressed the same subject, namely, abortion.

But that’s too obvious and logical.

They said that the Court’s interpretation would have a paralyzing effect on the legislative process not intended when the single-subject rule was adopted, by turning every topical sentence into a new subject for legislation.

That’s how abortion activists and their ideological cohorts on the bench need to break down – or at least slow down – the process. Piecemeal….nickel-and-dime it….hairsplit the syntax.

Proponents of the law were prepared for this.

…Oklahoma legislators have already submitted single-subjects bills – plan B in case the state Supreme Court rejected the law – that covers the multiple aspects of the single bill struck down by the high court.

For instance…

A bill requiring abortionists to give women ultrasounds before an abortion passed the state House of Representatives on Thursday.

OK, good. Keep at it.

Throughout the past year and more so in recent times, some analysts have said Barack Obama is much more skilled at campaigning than governing.  He likes to take issues directly to the people and whip up emotional reaction in the crowds through commanding rhetoric.

But that routine has grown more transparent. Just recently, MSNBC noted Obama is trying to tap into the anger his administration has caused and lead the call for change. Even though what the people want is change from his administration’s politics.

Now, he’s campaigning again, taking his health care reform plan to the people and trying to whip up support. But as usual, he does this by blaming others for the people’s discontent and…leading the call for change.

Let’s take a look at this…

Trying to rally the public and put more pressure on Congress to act quickly, President Obama on Monday took to the road to castigate insurance companies and urged voters to lobby for passage of the healthcare overhaul….

Obama argued that his healthcare proposal trumped politics.

Sure. Just say it convincingly and it will be so. (Oddly, the advice to Dorothy comes to mind….”Just tap your heels three times and say ‘I want to go home’…”)

“I don’t know how passing healthcare will play politically, but I do know that it’s the right thing to do,” he said. “If you share that belief, I want you to stand with me and fight with me. And I ask you to help us get us over the finish line these next few weeks.

Okay, look….

Virtually nobody is saying health care is the wrong thing to do. Let’s be honest. We universally share that belief. But note the lack of specifics in this appeal to emotion by the community organizer-in-chief.

“The need is great,” he said. “The opportunity is here. Let’s seize reform. It’s within our grasp.”

When read as text in print and not heard with the dramatic delivery and staged backdrops, it’s just general blanket rhetoric. And he’s got plenty of that.

“The time for talk is over,” Obama said. “We need to see where people stand. And we need all of you to help us win that vote. So I need you to knock on doors. Talk to your neighbors. Pick up the phone. When you hear an argument by the water cooler and somebody is saying this or that about it, say, no, no, no, no, hold on a second.

What? Oh, he’s whipping up emotions again. Forget facts. They just bog things down.

And we need you to make your voices heard all the way in Washington, D.C.

No kidding.

“They need to hear your voices because right now the Washington echo chamber is in full throttle. It is as deafening as it’s ever been. And as we come to that final vote, that echo chamber is telling members of Congress, wait, think about the politics — instead of thinking about doing the right thing,” he said.

No, the people with whom this overhaul is so unpopular are crying ‘do the right thing’. It’s the party leadership voices echoing through the chambers that are warning members to think about the politics.

The White House has said the president would like to see the House act before he leaves for Asia on March 18, but House leaders have indicated they would be happy if that chamber acts before Easter break at the end of the month.

Just get it done, they demand. Because it’s critical to the president’s legacy.

Mr. Obama’s closing arguments are lending credence to rank-and-file fears that they’re getting played. Democrats are telling reporters that Mr. Obama has been telling them in private meetings that his Presidency, and the party’s claim to any achievement, rests on passing a bill. With barely any mention of substance, the right bill is any bill, by any political means necessary.

Even false promises.

Then there’s House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s far-fetched suggestion to Mr. [Bart] Stupak and the antiabortion [pro-life] bloc that Democrats can take care of their concerns in a third bill, which everyone knows will fail in the Senate if it even comes to the floor.

In this wilderness of political mirrors, anything is possible.

But because he sealed the deal on the campaign trail before, we will see Mr. Obama there again, as long as it takes. Or works.

For the first time in memory, the Motion Picture Academy Awards were understated and toned down, tasteful, on time, tightly controlled and well-paced, and most important of all….fair.

David slew Goliath.

The small independent war drama “The Hurt Locker” won six Academy Awards on Sunday night, including best picture and director for Kathryn Bigelow — marking the first time a woman has taken home such an honor.

The film, which has grossed less than $15 million, beat out the biggest box office film ever, James Cameron’s sci-fi epic “Avatar.”

“There’s no other way to describe this, it’s the moment of a lifetime,” said a tremulous Bigelow, upon receiving the directing Oscar at the 82nd annual Academy Awards at the Kodak Theatre. She dedicated the award to the men and woman in the military who risked their lives and wished that they’d all come home safely.

Yes, it was an honor for the men and women who live those terrible and traumatic realities in far away places while the rest of us enjoy our comforts and liberties.

I’ve seen a lot of war films, but ‘The Hurt Locker’ is unique in the way it tells the story. As one announcer said in the ceremony, ‘it’s not about left or right, it’s just a man on a mission’…and it’s really all the men and women serving a larger mission through their own particular sacrifices.

Well done. Very well done.