Democrats are having fun highlighting the "civil war" within the Republican Party, but their schadenfreude may be short-lived. Conservative and moderate Democrats are failing one liberal litmus test after another, stoking not just frustration on the left but also potential primary challenges.

Democrat Schadenfreude Short-lived?

Opinion By Jill Lawrence/Politics Daily

The list of those tests starts with the public option, a proposed government-sponsored health insurance plan that appears to be losing ground on Capitol Hill despite continued popularity in opinion polls. And that's just the beginning. As filing deadlines approach, particularly for later primaries, restive liberals could expand their scrutiny to votes on abortion, global warming, Afghanistan, gay rights and labor issues.

"Democrats are generally discouraged across the board because they don't feel that anything's getting accomplished," says Ben Tribbett, executive director of the Accountability Now Political Action Committee. Already there's the real possibility that Arkansas Lt. Gov. Bill Halter will challenge Sen. Blanche Lincoln, who has voted against a public option and is sagging in state polls.

Read the entire column at www.politicsdaily.com.

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