Alice Kingsley has nothing on Washington.

Never has the ability of democratically governed peoples to access information and express themselves been more significant. Opinion polling, 24 hours cable news, Blogs, opinion journals, instant communication capability with Senators and Congressman and political movements organized by little more than e-mail, web sites and ideas. In the case of health care what has been the impact on our political leadership? Nothing!

Despite overwhelming opposition, leadership in Congress and the White House remains undaunted by the minor contrivance of public opinion. This manner of arrogance is not unique; we’ve seen it before, just not to this degree over an issue so endemic to the lives of every single American and so impactful on the American economy.

Fear not, the Speaker will “parachute in” if necessary to pass health care under the assumption that the political fence in front of her cannot be scaled, bulldozed or gotten around. That’s a show I’ll pay to see, Botox at altitude.

The President is of the opinion that “we’re on the 5 yard line”, and “we can’t quit now”. The President’s offensive unit may be lined up at the opponent’s 5 yard line but the public opinion defense is standing around at the 35 wondering where the hell the offense went.

 Nearly every politician not occupying a seat on the progressive left is, in the best case, apprehensive about continuing the health care legislative process. Within 24 hours of Scott Brown’s election most began climbing over that fence the Speaker referred to. If Nancy doesn’t hurry up she’ll be parachuting into a vacant lot.

Despite the overwhelming communications effort on health care: [sic] “we just have not done a good enough job of messaging” according to Mr. Gibbs. Mr. Axelrod is sure that “once we pass it and people see what’s in it, they’ll love it”.

The fundamental idea that we’re not willing to roll the dice on a single party solution that represents 17% of the economy is not getting through. The premise that doing less might be more remains unconsidered.  Applying a standard that calls for both parties to participate if not agree on basic reforms is apparently incomprehensible. The idea that reform need not be revolution seems to be a concept incapable of parachuting into of the thinking of the leadership.

Look, we’ve taken the “one pill makes you larger”; let’s try the “one pill makes you small”.