Reply #50: Revisionist History on the PO [View All]

[Rilgin]

Actually, you are performing some revisionist history. Obama did not "get" the public option through the House. The House passed a few health care bills out of various committees on their own. However, the White House did not support any of those plans. In fact, what was messaged out of the White House was a meme that the House versions of Health Care Reform were not the important ones.

Repeatedly and often, the White House sent messages through the media that the bill being drafted by the Bacchus chaired committee out of the Senate would be the basis of the final plan. Everyone knew at the time that this would be the least progressive plan (or one of them) and would likely end up not including the PO.

The White House had alternatives to this approach such as publically backing one of the more progressive House Plans which included the PO and minimizing the importance of the Bacchus Bill. They could not control the ability of Bacchus to write a bill however, they could have treated his bill as they, in fact, treated the House Bills. Both ways would have lead to a confrontation with Conservative Democratic Senators. However, it would have shown actual support for the PO and may have actually led such Democratic Senators to having to choose between backing the White House or fighting with the White House. His approach showed that he would throw the PO option under the bus at the slightest objection.

His attitude to the Bacchus Bill would have been basically the the opposite of the one he took. This was not pushing the PO through congress as you have intimated. It was pushing it under the Congressional bus.