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Washington Sen. Charles Schumer (D) of New York says his party made a mistake by pushing to pass Obamacare in 2010.

Thats right: The third-ranking Democrat in the Senate says that expending legislative energy on President Obamas health-care bill was an unforced error. It used up too much time and distracted the White House and its legislative allies from continuing efforts to bolster the economy, which should have been their top priority, according to Senator Schumer.

Worse, the Affordable Care Act did not help that many people who actually vote, Schumer said. Only about a third of the uninsured at the time the bill passed were registered to vote, and only a fraction of that third actually voted, he said.

After passing the stimulus, Democrats should have continued to propose middle class-oriented programs and built on the partial success of the stimulus, said Schumer in an appearance Tuesday at the National Press Club. But unfortunately, Democrats blew the opportunity the American people gave them."

Wow, is Schumer right in this instance? Hes said in the past that he would have picked a different time to push the Affordable Care Act, but to repeat the argument now seems to be a conscious break with Obama administration orthodoxy.

If nothing else, hes making Republicans gleeful. Theyre holding up Schumers comments as yet more evidence that Obamacare shouldnt have passed in the first place.

So the Democrat Party got Schumered today, tweeted Joe Pounder, president of America Rising, a GOP opposition research political-action committee.

Mr. Pounder linked to a video of Schumers speech and said, well be using this a lot. Presumably, he meant that theyd be using it a lot in attack ads aimed at Democrats in 2016.

At its heart, Schumers view of how Democrats need to alter their image to win in 2016 is relatively widely held in Washington. The party thinks it needs to win over the broad swath of middle- and lower-income voters whose pay has stagnated for years.

Republicans want to be that party, too. They just have different ideas as to how to proceed. They would not agree with Schumer that an embrace of strong and active government is the answer.

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Is Chuck Schumer cutting Republicans' attack ads for them?