Democrats have long been the masters of messaging, adept at churning out emotion-packed sound bites, endlessly repeated, to drown out any viewpoint but their own.

But on the subject of Obamacare repeal and replacement, congressional Democrats have reached new levels of hysteria and hyperbole.

Consider the thoughtful reactions of Democratic party luminaries to the Republicans' American Health Care Act (AHCA) that passed the House Thursday afternoon.

House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.): "House Republicans are going to tattoo this moral monstrosity to their foreheads."  Followed by: "This is a scar they will carry."

Digging further into her bag of shop-worn clichés, Pelosi continues: "Republicans are maliciously again attempting to destroy health care and coverage for the American people."

Finally, Pelosi strikes a Halloween theme on Republicans: "You will glow in the dark on this one."  And on the AHCA bill: "It's come back like a zombie, even more scary than before."

Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez: "Trump and Republicans will own every preventable death, every untreated illness and every bankruptcy that American families will be forced to bear if this bill becomes law."

Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren (Mass.): "A bill that destroys health care for millions to shovel cash to the rich isn't a health care bill."  And for good measure: "Families will go bankrupt.  People will die."

New Jersey Democratic senator Corey Booker: "[T]he craven bill that I see coming to vote tomorrow is just cruel and just wrong."  And: "[T]his is clearly not just worse; it's a death knell."

Democratic Senate minority whip Dick Durbin of Illinois: "I will fight this Republican health care repeal in the Senate until Hell freezes over."

Democratic Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, in a note of comic relief: Republicans should "work with Democrats to improve our health care system in a bipartisan way."

And independent senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont predictably adds: "It really has nothing to do with health care.  It has everything to do with an enormous shift of wealth from working people to the richest Americans."

The party's lesser lights were quick to add their own assessments of impending doom:

Maryland Democratic rep. John Delaney: "This legislation is illogical, immoral, and wrong for the country."

And Democratic rep. Don Beyer of Virginia, echoing a Pelosi theme: "The passage of Trumpcare is a dark stain on the history of the House of Representatives."

Even though the president campaigned heavily on repealing and replacing "the disaster known as Obamacare," and even as the Obamacare system slowly implodes, Democrats seem to think they can ride any Republican dismantling of Obamacare to victory in 2018, as reuters.com recounts:

As Republicans crossed over the vote threshold to pass the bill, Democrats in the House began singing "Na na, na na na na, hey hey hey, goodbye," a rowdy reference to their belief Republicans will lose in the 2018 midterm elections due to their vote.

Rush Limbaugh points out from time to time that Democrats tell you whom they fear by whom they attack most savagely.  Democrats also tell you what they fear by what they attack most savagely. 

Even a partial legislative dismantling of Obamacare looms as an existential crisis for liberal Democrats, despite the Republicans' tendency to fumble on the one-yard line, and the barrage of Democrat attacks will continue as long as some form of repeal and replace is up for vote. 

Hillary and the Russians will be deprived of media oxygen because there is nothing bigger to Democrats than maintaining their Obamacare beachhead into single-payer government-run health care for all Americans. 

Obamacare was to be the pinnacle of progressive government in America, the monumental achievement of the Obama era.  And now a ragtag bunch of rabble-rousing Republicans, led by a blustering president who shouldn't be in the White House in the first place, are threatening to pull the joker out of the Obamacare house of cards.

The Democrats should have no credibility whatsoever on Obamacare, as the president tweeted on Thursday:

I am watching the Democrats trying to defend the "you can keep you doctor, you can keep your plan & premiums will go down" ObamaCare lie.

What the Democrats have not yet realized is that their reign as the masters of messaging is coming to an ignominious end.  They are being reduced to hysteria and hyperbole as President Trump, the master communicator, settles into the White House bully pulpit.  The Democrats do know, however, that if the Trump-era Republicans manage to pass an Obamacare repeal and replace bill, along with a major tax cut bill, it will be a long time before Democrats regain control. 

Prepare for further hysteria and hyperbole.