Here's today's news headline:

GOP unlikely to derail health care passage

Gee, you don't say.

What's so odd is that the headline is indicative of the way the press has portrayed the GOP throughout the health reform legislative process. Meaning, the Beltway press keeps pretending the GOP is a player, that the GOP is relevant to the health care reform. That the GOP could somehow “derail” the legislation.

The truth for months, of course, has been that Republicans members of Congress have been spectators, albeit heckling spectators. The GOP is in such a deep minority status that members don't have the votes to “derail” anything, even if virtually every member opposed health care reform, which is the case.

Yet the the press (cue USA Today) keeps pretending the GOP is right in the thick of things. That the GOP is somehow engaged in the process. That GOP leaders are knee-deep in negotiations. Instead, the GOP, having adopted a radical obstructionist strategy, has offered no tangible support and no real alternatives. Like I said, legislatively Republicans are bystanders in the health care debate. (Just like they were with the stimulus bill.)

So why do reporters pretend otherwise?