Democrats’ original 2014 campaign-season plan of owning ObamaCare with strong, positive messaging doesn’t seem to be panning out too well so far; as Mary Katharine pointed out last night, the creeping trend of moderate Democrats turning sour on the “Affordable” Care Act and all of the groan-inducing news about its complicated, sloppy, and economically damaging implementation means that certain Democrats in Congress are probably looking to back away slowly from directly embracing the law in their reelection campaigns.

Democratic Rep. Jim McDermott, although still very much a fan of the general idea of ObamaCare, had some words for the administration on the way they’re handling the rollout. A Tuesday evening Politico piece, recounting how the White House realized they had a potentially major problem on their hands with Democrats after Sen. Max Baucus’s now-infamous “trainwreck” remark, and quietly moved White House chief of staff Denis McDonough into the “job of Capitol Hill confidence builder.” McDonough has reportedly spent the last few months “soothing Democratic anxieties over the most divisive health care expansion in decades,” but perhaps not including as many Democrats as they might have — because in response to the piece, McDermott wondered… “Who?” Via the WFB:

“The White House has been terribly inefficient in dealing with the promotion of their bill. The 2010 election was a referendum on it, and they sat quietly and we lost the House, after we’d gone to bat for this bill, we then lost the House,” McDermott said. …

“I don’t know who he is. If he were sitting here in this room, I would not know him,” he said. “Maybe he’s been someplace, but I’m on the Ways and Means Committee, I’m the ranking member on the Health Subcommittee that’s implementing the bill, I’ve never seen him.”