"Wednesday, March 24, 2010, was the worst day for U.S. diplomacy in recent memory.

"Between sunrise and sunset, we 1) handled our Israeli allies as enemies, 2) treated Pakistani gangsters as our benefactors and 3) got blindsided -- brilliantly -- by the Russians...

"This isn't a pattern of failure. It's a surrender cult."

"Republicans have a powerful rallying cry in 'repeal, replace and reform.' Few voters will want to keep onerous mandates that hit individuals and taxes that hobble economic growth. Rather than spending a trillion dollars on subsidies for insurance companies and Medicaid expansion, as ObamaCare does, Republicans should push for giving individuals the same health-insurance tax break businesses get, which would cost less.

"Republicans must also continue to press for curbing junk lawsuits, enabling people to buy insurance across state lines, increasing the amount of money they can sock away tax free for medical expenses, and permitting small businesses to pool risk.

"Opponents of ObamaCare have decisively won the battle for public opinion. As voters start to feel the pain of this new program, Republicans will be in a stronger position if they stay in the fight, make a principled case, and lay out a competing vision."

"The most mendacious, cruel, and destructive proposition put forth by the Democratic congressional leadership — and soon by almost all its rank and file — is, of course, the outlandish claim that the bill will reduce the deficit.

"The uncontrolled growth of the annual deficits and total public debt is at the crux of the public’s slack-jawed horror of Washington policy these past 18 months. Washington is placing our grandchildren’s prosperity on a slow boat to China."

"As America's teetering tower of unkeepable promises grows, so does the weight of government, in taxes and mandates that limit investments and discourage job creation. America's dynamism, and hence upward social mobility, will slow, as the economy becomes what the party of government wants it to be -- increasingly dependent on government-created demand."

"Never before has the average American been treated to such a live-action view of the sordid politics necessary to push a deeply flawed bill to completion. It was dirty deals, open threats, broken promises and disregard for democracy that pulled ObamaCare to this point, and yesterday the same machinations pushed it across the finish line...

"President Obama was elected by millions of Americans attracted to his promise to change Washington politics. These were voters furious with earmarks, insider deals and a lack of transparency. They were the many Americans who, even before this week, held Congress in historic low esteem. They'll remember this spectacle come November."

"And so it ends, with a health-care vote expected this weekend. I wonder at what point the administration will realize it wasn't worth it — worth the discord, worth the diminution in popularity and prestige, worth the deepening of the great divide. What has been lost is so vivid, what has been gained so amorphous, blurry and likely illusory. Memo to future presidents:  Never stake your entire survival on the painful passing of a bad bill. Never take the country down the road to Demon Pass."

"America will be in a constant health-care war if ObamaCare is enacted. Passage wouldn't end the health-care debate. Rather, it would perpetuate ObamaCare as the dominant issue for decades to come, reshape politics, create an annual funding crisis in Congress, and generate a spate of angry lawsuits. Yet few in Washington seem aware of what lies ahead."

"The latest posting from the Treasury Department shows the National Debt has increased over $2 trillion since President Obama took office.

"The debt now stands at $12.6 trillion. On the day Mr. Obama took office it was $10.6 trillion.

"President George W. Bush still holds the record for the most debt run up on his watch: $4.9 trillion. But it took him over four years to rack up the first two trillion dollars in debt. It has taken Mr. Obama 421 days."

"The United States, like other developed nations, was on a glide path toward entitlement meltdown even before Barack Obama ascended. But his acceleration of the descent has been stupefying. If the health care/student loan behemoth passes, Democrats will have combined two of the greatest follies of recent decades."

"Whatever their sins, insurers are mainly intermediaries; they pass along the costs of the delivery system. In 2009, the largest 14 insurers had profits of roughly $9 billion; that approached 0.4 percent of total health spending of $2.472 trillion. This hardly explains high health costs. What people need to know is that Obama's plan evades health care's major problems and would worsen the budget outlook. It's a big new spending program when government hasn't paid for the spending programs it already has.

"'If not now, when? If not us, who?' Obama asks. The answer is: It's not now, and it's not 'us.' Pass or not, Obama's proposal is the illusion of 'reform,' not the real thing."