Various representatives of the Barack Obama administration were out on the Sunday talk shows in the U.S. today, trying to spin the election of Senator Scott Brown (R -MA) [and how often do you see that abbreviation?] as being an endorsement of the Obama agenda, particularly with regard to health care.

I witnessed the White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs, on “Fox News Sunday,” attemping to do this very thing. Gibbs was making the very same kinds of arguments to host Chris Wallace that Howard Dean tried making a few days ago to MSNBC‘s Chris Matthews. Wallace was a lot more tolerant of Gibbs’ incoherent position than Matthews was of Dean’s. This is rather ironic, of-course, since Chris Matthews is well known for being a dyed-in-the-wool liberal, while Wallace works for the hated “conservative” media entity, Fox.

If you haven’t already viewed the encounter between Chris Matthews and Howard Dean the other day, I highly recommend watching it. And, as you do watch it — and in between busting your ribs with laughter — please realize that the utterly illogical position which Dean is taking on the Massachusetts election result has become — as of today, apparently — the official position of the Barack Obama administration. Gibbs today was referring to the very same post-election poll that Howard Dean was citing for his absurd conclusions as to the message of the voters.

In another indication of the direction in which the Obama administration plans to go, his 2008 campaign manager, David Plouffe, is reportedly going to be advising him more closely from now on. Plouffe scribbled an Op-Ed in the Washington Post today, which reveals plenty about the kind of advice which Obama is seeking and which Plouffe is delivering. Plouffe insists that despite the Massachusetts election result — or, actually, because of it — the Democrats must pass ObamaCare in some “meaningful” form without delay. As he puts it:

Americans’ health and our nation’s long-term fiscal health depend on it. I know that the short-term politics are bad. It’s a good plan that’s become a demonized caricature. But politically speaking, if we do not pass it, the GOP will continue attacking the plan as if we did anyway, and voters will have no ability to measure its upside.

Get that? President Obama and the Democratic party have been talking about reforming the health care system for a year, and trying to sell it to the American people. Yet, voters are somehow too stupid to understand how good it’s going to be for them. The only way they’re going to understand the “upside” is if it is passed into law against their (very clear) will. Then, like it or not, they will start enjoying the benefits, and ultimately give thanks to President Obama and the Democrats for delivering those benefits.

There’s rarely so clear an example of the mindset that says, “Government knows better what you need than you know yourself.”

I’ve already asserted in the last few days that I believe the health care bill as envisioned by President Obama is dead. I continue to believe that it is; i.e. that it will ultimately fail to be implemented.

However, as I wrote in the minutes after it was clear that Senator Scott Brown (R-MA) had won last Tuesday, “President Obama will not abandon his plan, because he is a true believer, and it is crucial to his strategy to remake America.” And, based on the public messages sent by his representatives today, President Obama has indeed decided to push forward for a health care bill, despite the fear and chaos in the ranks of congressional Democrats. He has understood and continues to understand that, whatever the details — public option or no public option — once the federal government gets its grasp around health care in America, a huge and fundamental victory has been achieved by the Left. Elections will increasingly be fought around the question of which candidate or party is going to give the voters more benefits, in one way or another. Have a problem with your health care or health insurance? For millions, it will no longer be a question of complaining to their providers or insurance companies or employers, or shopping around in any sense. It will instead be a question of looking to the government for a solution; the fix will need to be sought from one’s congressman, senator, or president. And once elections are fought on such issues, the battle, in a larger sense, is over.

Americans will have to learn to like it, and to see the “upside,” as Plouffe puts it, because they will simply have no choice.

This is why President Obama is not giving up on it; this is why his representatives were out today pushing their incredibly illogical and bizarre interpretation of the Massachusetts election result; and this is why — after everything that’s happened in the past week — complacency is still not an option. ObamaCare lost its heartbeat last Tuesday, but the zombie of ObamaCare continues to pursue us.

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