10/27: Inching Toward Victory?

It was less than three weeks ago that we first reported that liberal bloggers were buzzing about a public option compromise proposal that they actually found acceptable -- a public option with a state opt-out clause. Well, it appears that lefty bloggers have gotten their wish. The netroots were surprised and pleased when Senate Maj. Leader Harry Reid announced yesterday that he'll include an "opt-out" public option in the merged Senate health care bill. Liberal bloggers have never trusted Reid, so they were impressed by his decision, calling it "probably the boldest thing Reid has done as Majority Leader." That said, they're not sure whether Reid will actually be able to convince all 60 Dems to vote for cloture. While some lefty bloggers believe that Reid wouldn't bring this bill to the floor if he weren't confident in his ability to get 60 votes, others have little confidence in Reid's vote-counting abilities.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Erickson, Morrissey, Hinderaker) are buzzing about the new Club for Growth poll showing Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman leading both Bill Owens (D) and Dede Scozzafava (R) in the NY-23 race. That said, liberal blogger Nate Silver is skeptical of the poll.
• Last week we noted that RedState editor Erick Erickson criticized MN Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R) for declining to endorse Hoffman. Well, it appears that Pawlenty got the message, as he emailed Erickson yesterday to announce that he was endorsing Hoffman. Now Erickson is urging two other potential WH '12 candidates -- ex-MA Gov. Mitt Romney (R) and ex-AR Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) -- to "man up and stand with the base of the GOP" by endorsing Hoffman.
• Conservative bloggers (Morrissey, Bandes) are criticizing Scozzafava for receiving the 2008 Margaret Sanger Award from the Family Planning Advocates of New York State.

REID: So He Has A Spine After All!

Liberal bloggers were surprised and pleased when Reid announced his plans to include a public option with a state opt-out clause in the merged Senate health care bill:

• MyDD's Nathan Empsall: "This is probably the boldest thing Reid has done as Majority Leader."
• TalkLeft's Big Tent Democrat: "All the right moves and all the right noises. Still a fight ahead, but good on the Dems today."
• BooMan: "Congratulations to everyone who has been working tirelessly to see that a public option is included in the Senate bill. Harry Reid listened to you. Apparently, the Democratic members of Congress listened to you, too, because they seem to be willing to vote for cloture to start debate on a bill with a public option. And, despite some skepticism, the White House is now convinced that they can get a public option through the Senate on the first pass. This is better than anything that was realistically imaginable in the spring."
• digby: "I think Reid deserve some credit here. He's been under tremendous pressure to essentially bring the Finance Committee bill to the floor and have a flurry of various failing kabuki amendments on the public option so the Villagers could say 'I told you so.' But he's been under a lot of pressure from his left as well, and not just from the netroots, but from his own caucus, which is a hopeful sign. [WV Sen.] Jay Rockefeller, for instance, has been surprisingly tough. Reid went the right way today and took reform another step in the right direction. Having said that, it's premature to get too excited. There are many shoals ahead."
• Open Left's Mike Lux: "Okay, folks, we progressives got what we wanted. A comprehensive health care reform bill with a reasonably strong public option will be going to the floor as part of leadership bills in both the House and the Senate. We don't yet know whether we will get the best version of the public option in the House bill, and the Senate version is not as strong as progressives have been pushing for. But strengthening the form of the public option can be negotiated over in conference committee, once we get there."

Atrios offers a characteristically sarcastic take: "I'm all for there being a decent public option, but am still disturbed at the apparent coup which has removed President [Olympia] Snowe from office."

REID II: But Does He Have The Votes?

Several lefty bloggers believe that Reid must be confident in his ability to get all 60 Dems to vote for cloture, or he wouldn't bring this bill to the floor:

• Open Left's Chris Bowers: "Given this news, it certainly seems as though Reid has managed to acquire 60 votes for cloture on a health care bill with the opt-out public option. [...] This certainly seems like a very, very big victory."
• MyDD's Josh Orton: "[W]hile people have said many bad things about Harry Reid, I'm pretty sure no one's ever accused him of being a legislative show horse. Or dramatic. He's just not going to announce a base bill that he doesn't reasonably expect will win 60 cloture votes. Can you imagine what a huge defeat that would look like? Reid can too."

Balloon Juice's DougJ isn't so sure: "TPM has a great interview with [NY Sen.] Chuck Schumer about the discussion between Harry Reid and the White House on the opt out public option versus the triggered public option. It certainly sounds like the White House doesn't trust Reid to count votes. And I don't either."

PUBLIC OPTION: Pat Yourselves On The Back, Netroots

Several lefty bloggers are arguing that the netroots played a big role in ensuring the public option's survival up to this point:

• Bowers: "Quite a few Democrats did not like it that Congressional Progressives were threatening to defeat a health care bill without a public option. However, without that threat, there is simply no way that the public option would still be alive, much less near victory. Making that sort of threat on a piece of must-pass legislation was necessary both in order to make the legislation better, and also to finally make Congressional Progressives as relevant to the legislative process as Blue Dogs and Conservadems."
• The Huffington Post's Peter Daou: "Although it's far from clear what the final health care bill will look like, especially the public option (opt-out, trigger, etc.), there's absolutely no doubt that it is alive primarily because of the vigorous efforts of online progressive activists and bloggers on Huffington Post, Firedoglake, Daily Kos, TPM, Think Progress, Media Matters, Salon, AmericaBlog, Crooks and Liars, and hundreds of smaller sites (not to mention MoveOn)."
• FiveThirtyEight's Silver: "[N]one of this would have been possible without the yeoman effort of a relatively small number of bloggers and activists -- they know who they are -- who were tired of taking 'no' for an answer. They wanted this fight because of the paradigm-shifting implications it could have for how business gets done in the Democratic Party. And, somewhat to my surprise, they're having it."
• Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher: "Pressure on Reid from progressives when his poll numbers are flagging made him defy the White House. More importantly, he ratted them out to the press. [WH CoS] Rahm [Emanuel] thought he could continue to push for triggers in the background and satisfy the base by mouthing gibberish about 'the President supports a public option' until it was too late. It didn't work out so well."

PUBLIC OPTION II: More Information, Please

Some liberal bloggers want more information about the state opt-out clause that Senate Dems are attaching to the public option:

• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "One point I'm not clear on with regard to the idea of an 'opt-out' public option is who does the opting? If the way it works is that you need concurrent affirmative action by both houses of the state legislature and the governor, then it strikes me as very likely that the public option that emerges from an opt-out process will be very strong. If governors can do it unilaterally, then you'll get something with more of a swiss cheese quality to it. Similarly, if a state has opted out and decides four years later that it wants in, who gets to decide?"
• Bowers: "Some claim that virtually no state will opt-out, because the public option is so popular. Others claim that many red states, plus Florida, will opt-out pretty quickly. Figuring out how states will be able to opt-out will be key to knowing whether it is worth pushing for a better opt-out, or a weaker national public option."

Several lefty bloggers are expressing skepticism about the opt-out clause:

• Hamsher: "Having a state opt-out that will make corporatist Democrats happy is quite likely not to be 'available nationwide from day one,' and thus does not meet the the definition of a 'robust public option' by anyone's terms. Depending on how an opt-out was written, it could potentially disenfranchise large parts of the population. [...] Providing health care for the nation is a moral issue, it's not about getting a 'political win.'"
• Daily Kos' David Waldman: "Only Harry Reid knows for sure, but it's still unclear to me just whose votes were put in play with the inclusion of the opt-out. I've heard it said that Olympia Snowe (R-ME) says that the so-called 'trigger' is her tipping point. But has anyone ever heard anyone say the name of a Senator known to be a 'no' vote on a straight-up public option, but a 'yes' vote if you include the opt-out?"

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The Presidency And The Rise Of The New Partisan Press

Yale Law prof. Jack Balkin:

"The irony of the Administration's response to Fox News is its declaration that Fox is not a 'legitimate' news organization. It is not a legitimate mid-twentieth century news organization. But it is a legitimate nineteenth century news organization and it could well be what twenty-first century news organizations increasingly look like. The concept of 'legitimacy' in news gathering and reporting is not timeless and forever fixed; the point is that it is now very much up for grabs. What the Obama Administration is trading on in its attacks is the notion that 'legitimate' journalism is 'objective' twentieth century journalism, and since Fox is not that, it is not legitimate journalism. Fox, for its part, actually plays into this framing because it insists that it is fair and balanced and objective, when it is anything but. Fox has been trying to have it both ways since it began; the Obama Administration is now calling its bluff, and attempting to redefine it as not legitimate according to a previous (but increasingly challenged) conception of legitimate journalism.

In the long run, it will probably be better for the Administration and future Administrations not to say that Fox and its successors are not 'legitimate' journalists, but that they are not actually objective journalists; instead they are members of a new party or partisan press. That model of the press may be legitimate in the twenty-first century, but politicians have no obligation to treat it as they treated an earlier model of journalism."

LEST WE FORGET: Travel Channel Blows Its 'Bed And Breakfasts Of New England' Wad

From The Onion:

"GARRETT, MD -- After airing four consecutive days of programming devoted to mulled cider, antique weather vanes, and changing foliage, the Travel Channel effectively blew its New- England-bed-and-breakfast wad Monday with 8 weeks of autumn still to go. 'I guess we just got a little too worked up over these charming rustic retreats, and ended shooting our whole damn load,' said Travel Channel president Patrick Younge, admitting that for the rest of the season the network will rely primarily on warmed-over Bermuda and Bourdain. 'The whole thing's pretty embarrassing. I was sure we'd last a lot longer this year.' According to media analysts, no one has shit the bed this bad since the Weather Channel went balls out with its hurricane-season coverage in 2006."