Krauthammer, courtesy of NRO:

"The reason we are in this stew is because the dogs won't eat the dog food. You can sell it and have a pretty can, as people learn about it — that's the reason it's [failing].

"It's not because of tactics—it is not because Obama stayed out of it or he is overexposed or underexposed. It's not because of personalities—it's not because Teddy Kennedy isn't there or Tom Daschle.

"It is because of the numbers and the facts. And when the CBO, the non-partisan budget office, came in with the real numbers, the plan died.

"Now, it will come back, I think, in a very minor, watered-down fashion at the end of the year. But the overhaul of this economy — of 1/6 of this economy — that Obama has promised will not hold up.

"It's because at the beginning he said what he's going to do is expand coverage and reduce costs. A nine-year-old could tell you that can't be done, and the CBO has shown why it can't be done…

"The reason people are soured on all of this is because of the disingenuousness. We hear the president say that the public option is not a government takeover, and all it's about is keeping the insurance companies honest. Those are his words.

"Then we hear an important Democrat in the House [Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank] say that the public option is the way to get single-payer, meaning a government system, as in Canada. That's the only way to do it.

"And of course, everybody who listens to this understands that if you have a public option with endless subsidies out of the federal treasury, it will defeat and destroy all the private insurance, and we're going to end up like a British or Canadian system."