It seems almost unfair to expect President Obama to deliver his first official State of the Union address only eight days after last week's seismic upheaval in Massachusetts; the political ground has shifted dramatically and is still shifting.
The health care reform bill, seemingly on the verge of passage, has been stopped in its tracks.
Vice President Biden's son Beau has suddenly decided not to run for his father's old Senate seat.
Democratic Congressman Berry of Arkansas says he's retiring.
The great political handicapper Charlie Cook is busy rewriting his odds on House races and today alone found 15 Democratic seats more vulnerable than before.
From the president and his allies, however, come comments suggesting they don't realize what has happened. The president says the anger felt by voters in Massachusetts is the same sentiment that elected him. Leading Democrats all over town say they're not giving up their health care dreams and the president's 2008 campaign manager David Plouffe has been called back to duty. His first recommendation: ram the health care bill through.
Former Clinton adviser James Carville says Obama needs to blame George W. Bush even more than he has so far.
What the president may need as he prepares his big speech is to listen to the advice of Albert Einstein, who famously said that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity.
— Brit Hume is the senior political analyst for Fox News Channel.
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