After months of struggle, House Democrats unveiled sweeping legislation Thursday to extend health care coverage to millions who lack it and create a new option of government-run insurance. A vote is likely next week on the plan patterned closely on President Barack Obama’s own.

Who are these crazy people claiming the $787 billion stimulus bill hasn’t worked? It already achieved its main objective: a bigger federal government for you and me. And we’ve only just begun. The Obama 10-Year Plan (also called the federal budget), the Obama Healthy Government Initiative (usually referred to as health care reform in the ministries of propaganda formerly known as newsrooms), and the Heroic Obama Save the Planet Now Scheme (Cap’n Trade) could one day combine to make government in America nearly as large as the private economy.

Our editorial, “Ghosts,“ discussed the 20th anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army’s crackdown in Tiananmen Square. We lamented a declining interest in human rights, and noted that while in China, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi preferred to talk about climate change. Wei Jingshen is a hero of China’s Democracy Wall Movement and spent many years in Communist prisons. His Courage to Act Alone records his struggles. After The Wall Street Journal criticized Pelosi for not pressing human rights in China, Wei wrote in defense of the speaker. We believe our readers should see his letter, which appears here:

Thousand-Dollar Candy Bars: Obama’s Dangerous and Deceptive Economic Policy For those of us pondering whether President Barack Obama is—in his heart of hearts—driven mainly by extreme ambition, like most highly successful politicians, or instead by a deep devotion to extreme liberalism, we have received a surprisingly quick and definitive an swer. He is driven by both.

Catholic politicians seem to be everywhere these days. In Virginia alone, the governor and attorney general are both Roman Catholic. On the national level, Catholic politicians seem to be spilling out of every tabernacle in town. This is not surprising given that 24.5 percent of Americans are Catholic. Except for brief interruptions, American Catholics have remained loyal to the Democratic Party since the days of mass Catholic immigration when the party was quick to dispense desperately needed jobs and cash to struggling families in return for votes.