One of the big concerns liberals have about the health care overhaul effort is that President Obama and congressional Democrats will make bipartisanship a goal in itself, compromising the bill into mush to pick up a handful of Republican votes.

Now, Sen. Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, the acting chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, is making it clear that he sees bipartisanship as less important than getting a health care bill he considers effective.

“I certainly would love to have bipartisan support in the committee for the final product. But my goal here is to write a good bill. My goal is not bipartisanship,” Dodd told reporters this afternoon. “That can help you get to a good bill, but it’s not an end in itself.”

Guess the liberal House Democrats couldn’t let the centrists go unchallenged. A day after the Blue Dog Coalition declared they can only support a government-run health care plan if it has lots of limits, the Congressional Progressive Caucus said they won’t support it if it has any of those limits.

It’s not a surprise that the progressives would respond that way, but the statement is yet more proof that President Obama and House Democratic leaders will have a difficult balance to strike to get health care overhaul legislation through the House. Even though the House is considered the “easier” of the two chambers — it’s more easily controlled than the Senate, and there are no filibusters — the debate proves the White House can’t take the House for granted.

There’s still no real evidence that Judge Sonia Sotomayor needs to campaign that hard to get confirmed to the Supreme Court. But she’s going to try anyway, starting tomorrow, with meetings with 10 — count ‘em, 10 — senators in one day.

She has heard they filibuster sometimes, right?

According to the White House, Sotomayor will meet tomorrow with the top four Senate leaders from both parties: Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, and Minority Leader Jon Kyl of Arizona. Also on the itinerary are Judiciary Chairman Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont and Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the ranking Republican (for now)(for now) on the Judiciary Committee.