Can Obama still sell health care?

President Obama went back into high campaign mode Monday, pushing the Democrats' teetering health care bill to an enthusiastic crowd in Pennsylvania. As House and Senate Democratic leaders are counting votes in Washington, a "fired up" Obama is betting on an outside-the-Beltway strategy to boost grassroots support. But after months of cheering from the sidelines, is it too late for Obama to start really selling the health care overhaul? (Watch Obama campaign in Pennsylvania for health care)

Better late than never: It's taken Obama a while to get up to speed on the "really hard job" of governing, says Steven Cohen in The Huffington Post. But he's lately found a "clear message" on health care — he wants an up-or-down vote — and he's successfully countering the GOP's ploy to "delegitimize" the so-called reconciliation process. I think he'll get his bill now.

"I wouldn't underestimate President Obama"

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Obama is all talk: The president's big rallying cry is "The time for talk is over," says Jim Geraghty in National Review. So why is he out on the stump, talking? His record with that phrase should give his supporters pause, too: Last time he used it was before the Copenhagen climate-change summit, "where no major deal was reached, and talk continued."

"Maybe the time for Obama's talk is over"

The bill will pass, almost despite Obama: Health care reform will probably make it through, now that Obama's "finally putting his whole sack in on it," says Dan Rather, via NewsBusters. But the GOP will savage him in the fall, both for the bill and the year it took him to get it passed — they'll say he's "very articulate" but "couldn't sell watermelons if...you gave him the state troopers to flag down the traffic."

"Dan Rather: 'Articulate' Obama couldn't even 'sell watermelons'"

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SEE MORE OPINION BRIEFS ON THIS TOPIC:

• Health care: Obama declares war

• Are Dems caving on health care?

• Health reform: Suicide for Dems?

• Obama's 11th-hour health care play