State of the Union

In his State of the Union Address tonight, President Obama called on Congress to finish the job on health care reform, but he did not specifically tell the House to pass the Senate bill, which is the most obvious, and perhaps only, path apparent for health care reform at this time.

He may be hedging his bets.  Or he may be laying the ground for the complicated strategy that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appears to have initiated today, a dual-track strategy that would involve working on multiple bills at the same time.

It was a big speech at a critical political time for the President, but it remains to be seen if it has any effect on health care reform.  We will see.

UPDATE: For a concise analysis of the overall speech, see Marc Shields and David Brooks on the News Hour.