Senator Joe Lieberman has successfully lobbied to have the public option, as well as the newer proposal of a Medicare buy-in to those 55 and older, removed from the Senate's version of the healthcare bill even though he supported it just months before.  In the wake of all this double talk and political posturing, liberal progressives who have championed the public option and more recently a new Medicare buy-in, have found themselves in a position of having lost everything they have fought for.

How did it get to this?

Back in May when the Senate Finance Committee led by Max Baucus (D-Montana), was organizing hearings from various interest groups and experts on Healthcare reform, one group that progressives desperately wanted at the table was Single Payer.  Single payer is the panacea of progressive healthcare reform and it wasn't even invited to participate in the preliminary discussions on how what the committee would include in the debate prior to formulating their version of the legislation.  Progressives fell in line, although they were furious at this snub.

The next phase of the political process introduced the American public to the concept of the public option insurance plan.  This plan was originally designed for the government to set up a nationally available health insurance plan to directly compete with private industry in an attempt to reduce out of control insurance costs.  It was supposed to be set up by the government, but would have been funded by consumers paying premiums and would not have received additional funding from the government to operate.  The House of Representatives were able to pass their version of a healthcare reform bill with a public option that the Congressional Budget Office scored quite well because it successfully reduced the deficit and cut costs.  However it came at the cost of the addition of the Stupak amendment which would have walked back a woman's right to choose abortion coverage when purchasing insurance within the newly created exchanges alongside the public option.  Once again progressives were asked to compromise on their position in the hopes of removing the Stupak amendment during the House and Senate bill merging committee meetings.

Once the House had finished it's work on healthcare, the spotlight urned towards the Senate and whether or not a version of the public option would be able to pass there.  Initial reports were cautiously optimistic that some version of a public option would make it in the bill, but it was not to be.  Democrats scrambled to come up with another plan and they turned to something that Joe Lieberman himself had advocated for, an expansion of Medicare and Medicaid to those 55 and older.  Progressives were extremely happy and threw their support behind people as young as 55 buying into Medicare and Medicaid early, however initial reports from the CBO weren't positive and Senator Lieberman renewed threats to filibuster the entire bill if the provision he used to favour wasn't dropped.

This is where we are today.  Progressives have seen all three of their plans dropped from the Senate Healthcare bill and now some are calling to scrap the bill entirely so that they can start over.  The prevailing wisdom, however is if Congress doesn't pass a bill at all, they wouldn't be able to return to any debate on the issue for a generation and Democrats would find themselves decimated in the 2010 midterm elections.  The question surrounding progressives is what kind of negotiations were going on that they were able to get nothing in return for each of their concessions?  There are good things in the bill to be sure, like an end to being dropped for preexisting conditions and the addition of 30 million people able to access healthcare, but some see the mandate to buy insurance as nothing more than a boon to profits for the insurance industry while not actually reforming healthcare.

No matter what happens it's clear that the powers that be either don't care what progressives think or progressives are the worst negotiators in America, but I think if the bill fails then the President's primary platform goal has failed and the Democrats will pay a heavy price come November 2010.