There has been a variety of reporting about Nancy Pelosi’s ongoing efforts to whip the necessary votes for a robust public option. She is close to securing 218 votes, but is not there yet. My question is who are the roughly 40-50 Democratic House members fighting to steal $1,400 every year from hard working American [...]

A public option is something that 80% of Nevada Democrats want.

Call Nevada Democrats and let them know Reid says he has the votes for a public option, he’s just not sure he wants one.

Reid is leaning toward a public option with an opt-out in defiance of Snowe and Baucus. The only reason the public option has gotten so far is because the progressive grassroots would not let Congressional Democrats throw it under the bus. On a related note, Nevada is being phone banked. Important but overlooked is the lack [...]

ABC is reporting Reid is leaning towards putting a national, weak, “level playing field” public option with an opt-out provision in the merged bill. The move could be a result of real leadership, terror at the thought of losing his election, courage, profound personal conviction, incredible pressure from inside the caucus, necessity, or a combination of [...]

From the start, Rahm has calculated that a political “win” was the most important objective of health care reform, and that what was good for Democratic campaign coffers was good for the country. He might want to have a word with Harry Reid, who’s sitting on a record haul and a 38% approval rating going into his 2010 race.

With a sluggish economy, 2010 may be brutal. Jamming progressives and red state Democrats with “opt-outs” just so Evan Bayh can make Wellpoint happy may provoke the very electoral massacre Rahm fears.

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) was 100% correct today when he said: “More than 50 members of the Senate are supportive of a straightforward public option, even with the opt-out,” he said on ABC News’s “Top Line” webcast. “The trigger is a way for the insurance companies to win.” I completely agree. A trigger will never [...]

Ezra Klein really thinks health care exchanges will work at driving down cost despite there being little to no evidence to back up his theory. In fact, today, he just admitted that there is strong evidence to the contrary: For people, like, well, me, who think that the health insurance exchanges have a real shot [...]

Marta Evry of Venice for Change has a great diary up on Kos with tips for calling Nevada Democrats about Harry Reid and the public option: TIPS FOR MAKING SUCCESSFUL PHONE CALLS I ran hundreds of phone banks during the general election last year. Here are a few tips I hope you will find useful. [...]

The FDL Action phonebank is live now. You can start calling progressive Nevada Democrats now and asking them to contact Harry Reid and tell him to put a public option in the final Senate bill.

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) told Poltico that he felt Harry Reid (D-NV) and the White House were leaning toward a national public option with an opt-out: Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) briefed Nelson and other Democratic centrists on Thursday morning. “I keep hearing there is a lot of leaning toward some sort of national [...]