Takes one to know one...

It's interesting how we see now how Congresswoman Pelosi is being left to slowly twist in the wind, with the White House ... oddly reluctant to intervene in her public exposure as a liar and her consequent humiliation.

Of course, Pelosi is a party politician: Jim Miller saw this in 2002 (hat tip: NeoNeoCon), and the history of how she rose to power has been fairly well documented.

But consider as well that President Obama is also a product of the party machine, but in this case the Chicago party machine: what we are seeing is how one party machine dismantles the power of another party machine, in this case by letting Pelosi's native abilities shine.

While her days of power aren't in doubt - she's too powerful for that - what this will do is to clearly demonstrate to the party faithful, those who have enormously benefited from the party machinery, that party discipline is important and that the best way for them to behave is not to create problems for the Chicago party machine.

Which means that she'll have to get used to her future role: of delivering the House Democrats to whatever it is President Obama wants.