If the Congressional agenda is a problem for the Democrats, it’s a problem that has flowed straight from the White House.

As the Brookings Institution’s Bill Galston told me: Any “mistakes were mistakes of strategy and tactics that went well beyond her. She was trying her best to enact into law the agenda on which the president campaigned.”

Pelosi held a very diverse caucus together under incredibly difficult circumstances. The president was frequently disengaged publicly, even on his signature health care plan. And the Senate didn’t always hold up its end of the bargain.