“I know that there are those in this town who openly declare their intention to block reform,” Obama said Tuesday afternoon, not long before he sat down with Democratic House Energy and Commerce members — both Blue Dogs and progressives — to see if he could make some headway. “It’s a familiar Washington script that we’ve seen many times before. These opponents of reform would rather score political points than offer relief to Americans who’ve seen premiums double and costs grow three times faster than wages.” Expect more of the same at Wednesday night’s prime-time press conference — after which you can get back to watching “I Survived a Japanese Game Show!” — where Obama will once again try to force things along.

In fact, despite the panicky tone of a lot of the coverage of the debate, all the White House really needs to do this week is to prod Congress into keeping the legislation moving along. Aides on Capitol Hill expect any bill to wind up being changed, possibly dramatically, in a conference committee once both the House and Senate pass it; what Obama wants right now is just to get it there. Which is why the message out of the administration and its allies continues to be, basically, do something. “When we do pass this bill, history won’t record the demands for endless delay or endless debates in the news cycle,” Obama said Tuesday. “It will record the hard work done by the members of Congress to pass the bill, and the fact that the people who sent us here to Washington insisted upon change.” If that’s true, it might be a good thing — because for right now, at least, the debates in the news cycle are looking uglier and uglier.