The Democrats have gotten to the precipice to borrow President Obama's word of victory on health-care reform for one reason above all others: 60 votes.
Their supermajority in the Senate empowered them to muscle through a sprawling mess of a bill by partisan fiat. If the ball had bounced the other way in a close race or two (or if Arlen Specter had felt more loyalty to his party of decades), the Democrats wouldn't have gotten to 60. Once there, they were willing to resort to any expedient to stay at the magic number. After Ted Kennedy's death last summer, the Massachusetts legislature rushed to change state election law to allow for an interim replacement in advance of a special election, explicitly to keep the Democrats at 60.
