The problem with Kuch, are not his ideas.

Comedian and political commentator Bill Maher said Wednesday that President Obama's insistence on courting Republican votes on his legislative priorities has weakened his presidency and the outcome of health care reform.

"I think the biggest mistake that he has made in his first year was to put bipartisanship ahead of fixing the country," Maher declared Wednesday on MSNBC's Countdown With Keith Olbermann.

He said Obama should have "com in with all the energy from the election and saying, you know what, we're in a crisis mode, I won this election by a sizable mandate -- here's what we're going to do; if you don't like it, Republicans, you can suck on it."

The host of HBO's Real Time With Bill Maher has for months skewered Democrats on his show as too timid and lacking the courage to fight for their beliefs. Last summer he famously said, "We don't have a left and a right party anymore" because "Democrats have moved the right, and the right has moved into a mental hospital."

"They should have started with single payer," he told guest host Lawrence O'Donnell. "It's the one program that makes sense, but okay, we live in a country that doesn't make sense... If they had started from that, then the fall-back compromise position would have at least been the public option," Maher said, assailing Democrats for their ostensibly poor negotiation skills.