This is kind of painful.  Gabriel Winant in Salon was one of the many who jumped too quickly on Wednesday:

Liberals will live without the public option

The Senate compromise offers enough to make progressives forget about what had been a dealbreaker

Now that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has managed to produce a renegotiated healthcare deal, everyone has to figure out what to think about it.

There were some trial balloon floated, saying Reid has a deal. Which, of course, he doesn’t.

While Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., is hedging, liberals across the country are probably e-mailing each other right now, asking, “Where should we be on this?”

Liberals were actually emailing each other going “who would believe this?”

It’s early yet, but it’s looking like major progressive figures are feeling cautiously optimistic about the compromise Reid has crafted.

Congress Daily is reporting that Reid is going to file “simultaneous cloture motions” on a package of bills, none of which he appears to have the votes for.  Bart Stupak is saying they’re talking about throwing it in the omnibus bill, and beating members into passing it with “voting against the troops.”

It’s hard to imagine liberals killing this thing — as they threatened to do some months ago with any bill that didn’t contain a public option.

Grijalva and Waters reiterated yesterday that they will vote against the bill that doesn’t have a public option.

That means that if Reid has indeed found a compromise that can get enough centrist and conservative votes he’s probably got something that can pass.

Progressives in the House threatened to kill the bill without a public option.   Reid is in the Senate.  He doesn’t need their votes to pass a bill.

Yes, we know you know people at the White House, and they told you on the Q.T. that this was solid.

They lied.