Regarding the Public Option, it's worth watching this Frontline episode to understand how...

[ProSense]

16. Everyone should

watch this video in its entirety. It's fascinating.

The bill's passage depended on getting the votes of Democratic Senators who sided with the insurance companies. From the clip:

They killed the public option to appease Lieberman and others (not mentioned is that Blanche Lincoln voted against both versions of the public option in committee).

They lowered proposed taxes for medical device makers to appease Evan Bayh.

They expanded Medicaid to appease Ben Nelson.

The "bribe" comment was from Orin Hatch.

What's fascinating is that those three Democratic Senators (and others) voted to pass the Senate bill, but once Democrats lost the 60th vote and had to rely on reconciliation to pass the Conference Report, three Democrats bailed: Blanche Lincoln, Mark Pryor and, surprise, Ben Nelson.