Dear Harry: Don't fuck this up, you bland mothafucker

"This" being Health-Care Reform:

The notion that anyone is now actually in control of this process is an illusion. But to the extent that anyone's hand is on the tiller, it is Reid's. Over the next four weeks, it is Reid who will decide whether to permit votes — and in what order — on amendments that could make the final version look very different from the one approved Tuesday afternoon by the Finance Committee. There will be fights over the lack of a public option in the bill, and efforts to reinstate one.

Of all five bills, only the Senate Finance Committee's garnered any GOP support and that came in the form of the single vote of Maine's Olympia Snowe. And Snowe made it clear that her support on final passage is by no means assured, rattling off a laundry list of changes she'd like to see made.

Adding to the drama is the fact that Reid is facing re-election next year, and for the first time since 1998 he may face a challenge. Reid is already losing in polls to not one but two GOP challengers. Outside groups ranging from unions to business associations have spent $2 million either lauding Reid for his work on health care or demonizing him for socializing it, according to TNS C-MAG, a group that tracks political commercials. The split in the ads has been 60% negative, 40% positive. Reid has pledged to raise $25 million to defend himself.

In 2004, Senate minority leader Tom Daschle became the first leader in nearly 50 years to lose his seat. In the months before the election he was paralyzed in the Senate, afraid to do anything that might make him more vulnerable. Reid, it seems, is taking the opposite approach. "It's always difficult being in leadership when you're up for re-election," says Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow, a member of the Democratic leadership who faced a tough re-election in 2004. "But Harry's very, very committed. He understands the important role he has in history."