Mike Stark asks Eliot Engel if he will vote against a final conference bill that does not have a public option:

ENGEL: I’m going to do everything I can to make a public option happen.

How about the one thing that really matters, joining with 39 other Democrats to vote against any bill that doesn’t have one?

ENGEL:  Well I never say what’s going to happen down the road.

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If there’s another way of keeping costs down, if there’s another way to keep premiums down than the public option, I’m willing to look at it.  And if I can be convinced that a final bill does all even if it doesn’t have a public option, I’d look at it. 

So, in other words, exactly what the President is saying — he wants credit for "supporting" a public option now because he doesn’t want to take the shit he’d get if he didn’t, but he’s leaving a back door open to vote for the big insurance industry bail-out.  

Engel does say one thing that’s true:  "I believe that compromises come at the end, not at the beginning."  Engel is a cosponsor of 676 and has been taking money from single payer supporters for years — he should well know that a public plan is in a compromise.

Too bad he won’t even hold the line at his own compromise.  Too bad he wasn’t one of the courageous members who said "no public option, no conference."  Too bad he’s scurrying behind the door while Raul Grijalva and Keith Ellison lead the charge to defend the public option this week.

Too bad this could be a scene from his next re-election rally.

Elliot Engel’s offices:  (202) 225-2464,  (718) 796-9700,  (845) 735-1000, (914) 699-4100