The president is understandably frustrated that everyone wants to find out what’s in the Pelosi-Obama health-care bill. How are we going to pay for this? Why are we raising taxes on small business in a recession? Aren’t we already broke? Get moving, he keeps imploring lawmakers. But alas, Obama’s “shut up” message isn’t going over well:

In his Tuesday morning floor remarks, McConnell reiterated the Republican position that reform legislation shouldn’t be rushed and that passage of House and Senate bills should be pushed until after the August recess. McConnell also continued to target the president’s policy prescriptions for health care reform.

“We certainly don’t need to rush and spend a trillion dollars to enact this flawed proposal by the August recess,” McConnell said. “The proposals we’ve seen aren’t just incomplete, they’re indefensible at a time of spiraling debt and ever-increasing job losses. Maybe this is why the administration has started to insist on an artificial deadline for getting its reform proposals through.”

More importantly, the House Democrats are now in open revolt. This report explains:

A key House committee on Tuesday indefinitely postponed voting on health care reform legislation, after Democratic leaders were unable to line up enough votes from moderate members of their own party.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee canceled the session as it faced serious concerns about the legislation from fiscally conservative Blue Dog Democrats, who hold a large number of seats on the panel. The Energy and Commerce Committee is the only House panel with jurisdiction over health care that has not completed writing its version of the reform bill.

Minority Whip Eric Cantor says we are at a “cross-roads” on health-care reform. The bill either changes radically or it dies. The same might be said of the Obama presidency. If he can’t push back on the Congressional liberals and redesign health care, the core of his agenda will crumble and with it, his mystique as a transformative president.