Ryan Grim reported last night that dueling whip counts in the House would determine the fate of the public option.
The Blue Dog Coalition is engaged in a member-to-member whip operation in the House, beginning with a survey of its 52 lawmakers, to find out where they stand on critical health care issues. The principal focus is the public insurance option, but the canvass also touches on various tax and revenue increase proposals to pay for reform....
For the first time since they formed in 1995, the Blue Dogs have been out-organized by their liberal counterparts. The Congressional Progressive Caucus completed its first survey and began whipping back in the spring. They launched a final whip count last week that will be finished by Wednesday evening.
They indeed did finish Wednesday evening, and are still standing firm. Greg Sargent:
After conducting an internal and informal count of House liberals who are still willing to oppose health care reform without a robust public plan, Dem Rep. Raul Grivalja, the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, says he’s still confident that he has a big bloc of House liberals on board to vote against anything that falls short.
"We are comfortable with the sustained support for the public option and, for myself and others, the original letter we signed is still our position," Grijalva said in a statement emailed over to me, in a reference to 60 House liberals who signed a recent letter pledging to oppose any bill without a public option.
We'll see what the Blue Dogs have to report probably some time today.