Pete, you and I share the same mortification and bemusement over Nancy Pelosi’s recent comments. But it is interesting that those on the Left show no embarrassment and are delighted by her attempts to plant her flag (pole vault?) and refuse to recognize political realities. They are handing out the “atta girl” compliments, relieved that she exhibits all the determination and sense of urgency they hoped Obama would convey. (He, on the other hand, was playing it both ways — both doubling down on the rhetoric and downgrading ObamaCare as a priority.)

That’s the nub of the problem for the Democrats. What sounds like crazy talk to moderates and conservatives sounds like a welcome call to arms to their base. The more obsessive the Democrats’ rhetoric, the happier the Left is and the more the rest of us are inclined to laugh.

The great opportunity Obama had when riding into office on a wave of enthusiasm and personal popularity was to fuse all the elements in his own party and gobble up the center of the political spectrum, leaving Republicans with no political turf. Instead, the opposite has happened. His own party is in tatters, the Left is spinning fantasies that are destined to fail, and the rest of the country is looking for an alternative. It is not yet clear whether the GOP can seize the opening. But put it this way: anyone who thinks Pelosi sounds out to lunch is ripe for the picking. That’s a lot of Americans.