Ben Dolnick writes in to point me to this, from Megan McArdle, circa March 3rd:
I have never seen conservatives and liberals so divided . . . in beliefs, not values. On the one hand, there are people like the TNR crew, and Jonathan Bernstein, Andrew's guest-blogger, who seem to think that this it's the next best thing to a done deal. Meanwhile, all the conservatives and libertarians I know think that it's pretty much hopeless, because Pelosi can't get it through an increasingly rebellious House. To our jaded eyes it looks as if everyone who can is looking for an excuse not to vote for a bill that is unpopular with their constituents.
The opinions on both sides seem so confident, and so incompatible, that one group of people is clearly borderline delusional.
And now we know which one.
Actually, to be fair, it wasn't delusional or even borderline delusional to be skeptical that health care reform would pass. It was just a wishful reading of the evidence. Moreover, though I'd like to retrospectively take credit for the absolute certainty that McArdle misattributed to me at the time, I truly only thought health care had a 60% chance of passage, moving up to 75% this week, and only reaching done deal status when Bart Stupak hopped aboard.