At Late Night I do not ordinarily “do” policy; rather, I strive to establish a tone, a theme, if you will. But nevertheless for tonight I will attempt policy. I must. The healthcare debate has reached a crisis point. Something needs to be done: time is running out. It’s time for action, or the nation faces disaster.

Mike confronts Baron Hill, one of the Blue Dogs on the Energy & Commerce Committee who has joined with Mike Ross to threaten to keep a health care bill from passing.

While soon-to-be-ex Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin tweets through the night, Alaska’s bloggers are uncovering huge holes in the Palinista narrative that she has nothing to do with her legal defense fund.

Right now, the biggest obstacle to health care reform is an arch conservative “Blue Dog” Democrat called Mike Ross. As BT mentions here, this is more about preserving his own pork barrel than anything else. Tell Mike Ross to stop putting his personal pork-barrel interests before his country’s — and his state’s — survival.

Time has allowed a bunch of Bush partisans to put a nice spin on his non-pardon of Libby.

Mike Stark has been up on the Hill with cameraman Brett Vaughn of Brave New Films this week asking Democrats where they stand on a public plan.

In their down time, they decided to ask some Republicans a simple question: Do you believe that Barack Obama was a natural born citizen and constitutionally permitted to serve as President of the United States?

Dave Reichert (R-WA) has less problem answering the question

Enrollment in UnitedHealth’s private plans is falling, but the Medicare Advantage business is just fine. If they can get Congress to make everybody buy their insurance, they can really make some money.

Can you help us make it 30,000? You can use our invite tool to use your address book to let your friends and family know about the petition.

The Dow zoomed up 175 points this morning, smashing the 9000 mark for the first time since the depths of the Bush Depression in early January. Even better: Many analysts see the Dow easily hitting 10,000 again by year’s end, and some people see a 15,000-point Dow in the not-too-distant future. All just mere hours after President Obama’s landmark speech on health care last night.

The Chamber of Commerce—that’s the U.S. Chamber of Commerce—proved once again how anti-American it is when it comes to supporting U.S. industry.

In Findlay, Ohio, unions had been organizing a parade and all-day event for this Saturday to highlight American-made products and the need for U.S. trade and economic policies that reward job growth in this country.