Keep up the good work fellows: Their Ranks Bolstered, and With Big Issues Ahead, Democrats Stumble

From The New York Times:

Despite significant electoral gains in both the House and the Senate, the Democrats have been stymied by Republicans and a few Democratic defectors in what began as a fairly routine push to enact the leftover measures, needed to finance spending in the current fiscal year and tethered together into one $410 billion catchall bill.

As a result, Congress had to pass an emergency five-day stopgap on Friday to prevent an embarrassing shutdown of the government in the opening weeks of the Obama administration.

Republicans and others said some Democrats were clearly experiencing sticker shock over the combined costs of the new Democratic agenda, with the $410 billion measure coming on the heels of the $787 billion economic stimulus and just ahead of the $3.6 trillion budget for 2010 and money this year for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

After the Senate overcame decades of resistance and passed a bill that would give the District of Columbia a Congressional vote, House Democrats now find themselves unable to advance their version because Republicans are threatening to extract a vote on gun rights as the price. Many Democrats seem ready to go along, fearing a rebuke by the National Rifle Association more than the disappointment of their own leaders.