Weigel

Rep. Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio who's putting his hat in the ring to run the Republican Study Committee, told an audience at the Heritage Foundation today that the new Congress will vote as soon as possible on a flat-out health care repeal bill.

"The first big vote will be on taxes, unless they do the right thing and extend the cuts in the lame duck session," said Jordan. "If they do, then repeal will be the first big vote."

Jordan said this without predicting that repeal could actually pass in the Senate. "Maybe some of these senators have found the Lord," he said, nodding at how difficult the math is for a health care repeal bill to survive. "Our job is to do the right thing in the House and leave the rest to the Senate."

Jordan's description of the House GOP's role isn't very different from the description progressives have applied to Nancy Pelosi's House, a place where dream legislation passed, only to be sliced up or stopped in the Senate. Nobody has mastered the art of passing bills in one House, complaining that the opposition party is blocking it, and convincing voters that the fault is really with the opposition. But House Republicans will try.