Barack Obama is taking a breather on making public health care pitches (though he does still talk about it in fundraiser speeches, but that is different, we guess), according to the Times, who heard it from "aides."

This, of course, is the correct and sensible thing to do, because speeches and television appearances are much less effective at influencing Harry Reid than just, like, calling him up, personally, to tell him what you'd like in the bill, because it is basically all up to him right now.

That doesn't stop Sheryl Gay Stolberg from asking some tough and basically irrelevant questions:

But after his stream of all but nonstop public appearances on his top domestic priority, Mr. Obama's health care hiatus raises some questions: Was his continued presence counterproductive? Might his high profile prove to have been too polarizing as Democratic leaders negotiate through a thicket of political considerations in search of a deal that can get through the House and the Senate? Did the president stop talking because the public had stopped listening?

Is he doing this thing he is sort of doing for the reason he said he is doing it, which makes sense, or is it because of various things we are just making up right now that we have no evidence for, like maybe his making speeches made everyone hate Health Care? We'll never know for sure, but let's quote David Gergen now.

[Note: Results are from 1592 total votes in two polls; we started a new poll after we added Miami and New Orleans to the list. This placed Miami and New Orleans at a disadvantage, so they can claim moral victory. Although they wouldn't have won anyhow. Results rounded to nearest percentage point.]


New York: 32%
Chicago: 16%
Washington, DC: 16%
Detroit: 9%
Los Angeles: 6%
New Orleans: 6%
San Francisco: 5%
Boston: 5%
Las Vegas: 2%
Miami: 3%