The Los Angeles Times reports that President Obama has been working hard behind the scenes for a public option despite his public declarations of openness to alternatives.
The challenge is to go to the Senate floor and hold the deal, said Steve Elmendorf, a lobbyist who served as chief of staff to former House Democratic leader Dick Gephardt. "They are more involved than people think," he said. "They have a plan and a strategy, and they know what they want to get, and they work with people to get it."
White House strategy has included daily private meetings with Harry Reid and others on the Hill to determine the best way to get a public option in the final Senate bill, while still courting those conservative votes needed to reach 60.
The Times says Obama has been personally reaching out to rank-and-file Dems, "telephoning more than a dozen in the last week to press for action."
It also marks a crucial test of Obama's command of the inside game in Washington in which deals are struck behind closed doors and wavering lawmakers are cajoled and pressured into supporting major legislation.
He seems to be working in tandem with other Senate leaders like Schumer and Durbin.
New York Sen. Charles E. Schumer, the chamber's third-ranking Democrat, has been canvassing centrist Democrats to explore ways they might support a new government plan.
"I have talked to every one of our conservative members and they are open to some kind of public option," he told reporters last week.
And at a closed-door meeting of Senate Democrats on Tuesday, Assistant Majority Leader Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) marshaled polling data from districts represented by conservative Democrats that showed a majority would back the requirement that Americans get health insurance so long as there was a public option.
"To argue that this is some fringe position is to ignore the obvious," Durbin said.
Obama campaigned on changing the culture of politics in Washington, but he also promised he could fight hard when necessary. Soon we will see the fruits of his brand of savvy and bedside manner.