I occasionally accompany my posts about the disarray of the Democratic Party with pictures of Will Rogers, like the one at right. If you don't get the reference, it's because Rogers once joked, "I belong to no organized political party. I'm a Democrat."

In a few weeks, Barack Obama will have a chance to do something he hasn’t done particularly well during his first year in office: successfully defy his opponents and, at the same time, reassure his most loyal supporters. At issue is the fate of Craig Becker, one of Obama’s nominees for the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Last month, Becker was denied a vote on his nomination when Senate Democrats failed to overcome a GOP filibuster. Now, the Senate’s coming Easter break will give Obama an opportunity to put Becker on the NLRB via recess appointment.

One obvious question when Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd announced his retirement last week was what impact it would have on the effort to reform Wall Street. Dodd is chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, and the bill he wrote last year is the most ambitious regulatory initiative pending in Congress. Anything that changed Dodd’s calculus could have huge implications, which is why I was intrigued by a headline in the following day’s Wall Street Journal proclaiming that, “Dodd's Retirement Muddles Financial Overhaul.”

Polls show that Americans are confused about what health care reform means. And, if you listen to members of Congress on television, you get the impression that some of them aren’t certain, either. But figuring out what health care reform entails isn’t hard. All you have to do is look at Massachusetts.

WASHINGTON--President Obama can still secure major health care legislation this year if he learns from his mistakes in recent months and spends more time reminding Americans why they were once eager for fundamental change.

His White House lost sight of the need to make a strong case that reform would deliver specific benefits to the insured as well as the uninsured. Absent a consistent set of arguments from reformers, advocates of the status quo filled the vacuum--often with outright lies.

Kathy Castor, Democratic representative from Florida, held a town hall meeting on Thursday to talk about health care and to make the case for reform.

At least, that's what she tried to do. Here's what happened instead, via a video posted at Daily Kos.

From the Editors: As long as there have been politicians, there have been scandals. And the juiciest political scandals have always revolved around sex. With John Edwards finally admitting that he fathered a child with filmmaker Rielle Hunter, and torrid rumors circulating about an upcoming New York Times profile of New York Governor David Paterson, TNR decided to take a look back at the most famous of all sex scandals: Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky.