The great band Maze, featuring Frankie Beverly, has a hit song called "Joy and Pain." They sing that those two words are like "sunshine and rain."

That song seems to be the Democratic Party's theme song today, especially when you consider the battle that pits the two most important issues of the Democratic Party against each other — abortion and the president's most important domestic item: health care reform.

Just remove the political drama and admit that watching Democrats grapple with restrictions on abortion in a health care bill, thus possibly dooming it, is a masterstroke that Machiavelli surely would have loved.

When Sen. Ted Kennedy died earlier this year, we often were reminded how long he and other Democrats had fought for universal health care reform. It has been a staple of the Democratic Party's platform for decades, and all of its presidential candidates have had to spend sufficient time advocating for it.

But then you turn to a woman's right to choose to have an abortion or not, and you see an even more vigorous issue for Dems. Catholic Dems risk being slammed by the Catholic Church for their pro-choice views, and the party always has counted on women to stand firmly behind it because it was willing to fight every Republican attempt to restrict a woman's right to choose.

So when you have these two interests competing with each other, you have Democrats turning on one another and trying to maintain civility in the midst of the tears of those saying the Stupak-Pitts amendment's attack on abortion in the House health care bill was unconscionable and those who say their consciences do not allow them to stand for the use of federal dollars to pay for abortions.

The Stupak-Pitts amendment, which passed after more than 60 Democrats voted in favor of it, was the only way House Speaker Nancy Pelosi could guarantee a health care win. If she hadn't allowed it to be voted on, there is no way the conservative Democrats in her caucus would have voted for the overall bill.

But now the battle moves to the Senate, and already Catholic bishops, who flexed their muscles to get the Stupak-Pitts amendment counted, are saying that the anti-abortion funding language is considerably weaker.

And they surely won't like to hear Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, who made it clear to me on my TV One Sunday morning show, "Washington Watch," that no health care bill that will pass President Barack Obama's desk will restrict a woman's right to choose.

"We're not going to compromise on a woman's right to choose," Sen. Brown said. "This is a Democratic administration, Democratic House and Senate. I understand it was in the House, but it's coming out in the Senate. It's not in the Senate version. It's not going to be in the conference report."

He later added: "The Senate will never pass a bill that has those restrictions. In the House, we'll pass a bill without them; I'm convinced."

Brown may be matter-of-fact in his opposition, but I'm not so convinced. Sen. Harry Reid must have 60 votes to prevent a filibuster of the health care bill. With 58 Democrats and two independents, he has no wriggle room on this matter. If the Democrats continue to see three or four holdouts regarding this health care bill, we may very well look back and determine that the Trojan horse that killed one of the most fundamental issues to the party was also one of its most cherished positions.

And not a single Republican would have to take a hit for its failure. It all would be on the Democrats.

Roland S. Martin is an award-winning CNN analyst and the author of the forthcoming book "The First: President Barack Obama's Road to the White House as originally reported by Roland S. Martin." Please visit his Web site at www.RolandSMartin.com. To find out more about Roland S. Martin and read his past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.