Public Option still Alive - Up to Pres. Obama

by: Clem Guttata

Wed Sep 30, 2009 at 07:36:15 AM EDT

If you get all of your news from traditional media, you'll hear all sorts of stories that say the public option is dead. Fear not, the public option is still very much alive.

There's different ways of looking at it, but I side with Sen. Rockefeller in his views that President Obama is the key player who will decide the fate of the public option.

Rockefeller: The Public Option Is Not Dead

That's not the big story today though, Rockefeller said. "Actually, the big story coming out of today is that I got eight votes and Chuck got 10 votes -- and in effect that's like getting all the Democrats to vote for it."

Well, "most of the Democrats," Rockefeller corrected himself.

Rockefeller also said that he's "a little bit" disappointed in President Obama for not pushing harder for the public option.

"The crunch is really beginning to count now," Rockefeller said, adding a moment later that, "I think it's important that he come in at this point, strongly."

Echoing that the Senate Finance committee votes demonstrate a gain in momentum for the public option, Sen. Schumer Declares Moral Victory On Public Option:

"This was really good news for us," he said. "We're clearly not there, but not a single Democrat has said, 'I'm absolutely against the public option.' Chairman Baucus said he likes it but wants to see if it can get 60 votes, and we're feeling that we might get there."

Schumer emphasized that Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee are more conservative than Democrats in the Senate, who are in turn more conservative than House Democrats.

[snip]

The Senator also said health care reform that includes a public option would not be bipartisan.

"We're not going to get Republican votes, that's for sure. But more and more Democrats are open to it."

[snip]

"We lost today," he said. "We said we were gonna lose before the day began. We didn't expect it would be this close."

What happens next?

Chris Bowers laid it out yesterday: Next Steps on the Public Option.

The bad news is we learned today the Senate Finance Committee will not report a public option in its version of health care reform. The good news is we also learned today there are at least 51 Senate votes in favor of Schumer's public option.

He then goes on to provide an even more detailed explanation why it is up to President Obama as to what kind of public option (if any) we end up with in the final bill.

Because Democrats are not going to pursue reconciliation for the public option (see why here), the next step in the process does not actually involve Kent Conrad's Budget Committee, as I had previously reported (the Budget Commitee only comes into play with reconciliation). Instead, a source on the Hill confirms to me the Senate HELP and Senate Finance committees will be merged by an informal, behind the scenes process involving the four major players in the Senate: Tom Harkin (Chair of HELP), Max Baucus (Chair of Finance), Harry Reid (Majority Leader), and the White House. Together, these four will meet and decide what sort of bill to send to the Senate floor for debate and amendments.

During this process, we can guarantee that Harkin will push for a HELP or Schumer-like public option to be sent the floor, while Baucus will push for no public option to be in the bill at all. Given his recent statements, the best bet is that Reid will probably push against a public option too, and instead favor either triggers (which he has called a good idea) or co-ops (which seems to be the sort of public option he likes best). With two against and one in favor, this means that the only way a public option ends up in the bill that is sent to the Senate floor will be if the fourth major player, the White House, demands it.

It is all up to the White House now. If it pushes for a public option to be included in the health care bill sent to the Senate floor, then a public option will pass as part of health care reform (at that point, all we would need are 60 votes for cloture, and from what I hear we have 57 already). However, if it allows a health care bill to go to the floor without a public option, it is pretty unlikely that a public option will pass as part of health care reform.

As one final aside, given Sen. Harkin's pivotal role in merging Senate bills, here's what he said earlier this week.

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), the chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, said that the Senate "comfortably" has a majority of votes to pass the public plan, and that he believes Democrats can muster 60 votes to break a filibuster.

"I have polled senators, and the vast majority of Democrats - maybe approaching 50 - support a public option," Harkin said told the liberal "Bill Press Radio Show." "So why shouldn't we have a public option? We have the votes.

"I believe we'll have the 60 votes, now that we have the new senator from Massachusetts, to at least get it on the Senate floor," Harkin later added. "But once we cross that hurdle, we only need 51 votes for the public option. And I believe there are, comfortably, 51 votes for a public option."

The Iowa lawmaker's statements mark a bold claim that Democrats have the votes to pass a health bill in the Senate including the prized public (or "government-run") plan after signs for weeks now that centrist Democrats and virtually all Republicans would not support a bill including the provision.

So far, he's been proven correct.