Let’s not forget that six months ago no one expected us to have gotten this far toward reform in the first place. The insurance companies claimed that offering health care -in any form- to those with pre-existing conditions, removing caps on coverage and covering preventive care would bankrupt their industry and further devastate our ailing economy. If they succeed in assassinating any form of the public option, they are agreeing that covering these conditions is not only doable, but is preferable to competing with a government plan crafted for these purposes alone.

President Obama can’t propose using reconciliation, which was repeatedly used by the Republican majority to pass the Bush tax cuts, because he also promised during the campaign to change the dangerous trajectory of our political discourse from the destructive, decisive, hyper partisan path we’ve been on since the Reagan Administration.

Governor Dean and many of the progressives in the House now want to scrap the progress we’ve made thus far to start from scratch in hopes that this will give way to a public health care plan. Following this plan will send Congress home for winter recess having been defeated once again by the partisanship that the American people voted to end with the election of President Obama and allow the opponents of reform to develop a strategy to derail any chance of providing care to those who need it most.

Since the focus of the right has been concentrated on opposing any type of public option, dropping these provisions will defuse the basis for their argument against reform and open the pathway for our president to deliver health care reform covering millions of uninsured Americans during the first year of his term, provide political cover for moderate democrats up for reelection in purple districts and allow us to move on to dealing with other drastically important national priorities. The public option may be the best way to achieve comprehensive reform, but we can’t let the opportunity to deliver reform die with it.