Democrats must think this delay is to their net political advantage. Apparently, they have decided that enough voters will be mollified, caught napping and be outright deceived by their actions that it will make a difference in the November election. After all, life is all about the net, not the gross.

Anyway, this move is the opposite of leadership; it’s political cowardice, the like of which I don’t think I have ever seen. Do you think the president and his advisers laughed out loud as they hatched this plan? Do you think they even tried to suppress the snickering that must have occurred? Is their contempt for voters so great that they all share openly in the joke? Will Democrats in Congress be able to keep a straight face when they say this isn’t about the 2014 elections and maintaining control of the Senate? It will be scary if they get away with this.

And maybe they won’t. The latest generic ballots show Democrats slipping in support, in large part because of the mess of Obamacare. The Quinnipiac polling in the last week of September 2013 showed Democrats up by nine in the generic ballot. The same poll conducted in the second week of November 2013 had Republicans and Democrats tied. The White House’s own polls must be even worse.