A familiar, if somewhat hokey, plot device that we've all seen before is the battered villain, attempting to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, with a heavy dose of spite thrown in.

"You may think you've won but your victory won't matter once I've detonated this Smart-but-Evil bomb, a weapon with such destructive power that it will blow up this entire planet!!! Muwhahahahaha!!!"

The evil laugh is required.

Now, you wouldn't think to see this sort of thing this side of an old episode of Underdog but something very similar is going on this very minute in the national health care reform debate — such as it is.

The people who don't want reform to happen have that position for one of two reasons. Either they are making a lot of money with the system the way it is and they are not set up to change easily with the proposed reforms, or they want to inflict political damage on the President.

I don't know about you but I think those are two pretty poor reasons to want health care reform to fail.

You will notice that these opponents of reform are also not stepping forward to offer an alternative plan, or inviting Congressional Democrats or the Obama Administration to debate reform proposals on the merits, in the public eye.

To tell you the truth, they seem terrified that people might actually make rational decisions on the subject. They appear ready to do anything in their power to prevent that from happening.

That, I think, tells its own tale.

Most telling is this: these folks are so pre-occupied with the pursuit of their own petty agendas that they don't appear to care that our health care costs are eating us alive. They are prepared to let the whole country go down the toilet in order to score points off the President.

Smart-but-Evil bomb, indeed.

I don't even know what kind of a mind you have to have for that.