Pursuant to Republican Congressman-elect Andy Harris's unfortunate (for Republicans) and easily capitalized upon (for Democrats) incredulity that his government-funded health coverage will take a month to kick in, Democrat Joe Crowley has been goading Republicans on the question of whether or not they'll accept federally subsidized health care after campaigning, for months on end, against Democratic health care reforms, often referring to it as a "government takeover" of the U.S. health care system.

Crowley has circulated a letter to his Democratic colleagues, to be sent to House Minority Leader (aka Speaker-elect) John Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, asking them to "survey the Republican Conference to find out which of their members will forgo the employer-subsidized Federal Employees Health Benefits coverage before trying to make it harder for others to obtain affordable coverage."

As of now, 47 Democrats have signed it.

Leaving aside the fact that the federal insurance coverage offered to members of Congress is a separate issue from Democratic reforms, and the regional exchanges and federal subsidies the new law creates, the generic conceptual resemblance has made for a pressure point that Democrats have not been able to resist poking.