There won't be any admission of defeat or anything, but Democrats have missed a self-imposed action deadline, failing to get any bill out of two Senate committees before going on a July 4th break.

It doesn't mean that health reform is going into the ditch.  But it does mean that Democrats are finding it more difficult to forge an agreement amongst themselves than they had imagined.

Maybe Bill & Hillary Clinton weren't the problems fifteen years ago or - is that just ancient political history for too many people in DC now?

But we digress.

After eight days of open sessions in which the Senate Health Committee was publicly drafting a reform bill, it became painfully obvious yesterday that Democrats weren't going to be able to push a bill through by Friday.

Why not?

Because they don't have a finalized plan.

Last week when the committee work began, Democrats had left three major chunks of their bill blank. 

"Temporarily," said Sen. Chris Dodd, who has been leading the committee in place of Sen. Ted Kennedy.

But after promising both bill language and cost estimates repeatedly over the past two weeks, no one was expecting to see anything comprehensive on Wednesday - and even if it suddenly appeared in a poof of smoke, Democrats agreed they wouldn't force a vote until next month.

Next month was already the choice for the Senate Finance Committee, which continues to hold closed door meetings in which members of both parties are searching for bipartisan deal.  Now that panel is talking about releasing a broad summary tomorrow.

What does the delay mean?  It is most certainly a setback for Democrats.

But time will tell as to whether this is the beginning of the end or just a minor bump in the road.

The really big problem for Democrats right now is the Congressional calendar.  After a week off for July 4th next week, the Senate is in session for just five weeks - the House for four - before the Congress takes off until after Labor Day.

That means it will suddenly be September before you know it on Capitol Hill.  Only 25 Congressional work days until then.  And Labor Day is late this year.

Then September will be chopped up because it takes time to things back in gear.  That's not much time at all.  Especially after watching the glacial pace at which Democrats have been working.

And even when they work out the fine print, Democrats have to figure out how to pay for health care reform.  It's going to be a big price tag for this bill obviously.

At a hearing on Wednesday, Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius vowed that it would be fully paid for, through a combination of savings and "revenue enhancers."

Yep, that was the term she kept using, instead of just saying "higher taxes."

Which phrase do you think would hit home more powerfully with the voters?

The Democrats saying that they are for necessary "revenue enhancers," or the GOP saying that Democrats want to raise your taxes?

The clock is ticking on health reform. 

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