I'm feeling pretty good about getting a decent bill. We've come a long way from where we were in August. The insurance industry and its shills on the hill have overreached and have no credibility, and a broad consensus has developed that the Public Option is the only way to keep down costs. There are no good reasons to be against it, if you're a Democrat, and voting against will bring the unwelcome negative publicity that the vote is controlled by the insurance industry. The only ones standing in front of a good bill are a few conservadems who are needed for a cloture vote when the Republicans filibuster. These conservadems will be under enormous pressure to vote for cloture, because it would be historically unprecedented for a Democrat to vote in support of a Republican filibuster. You can be sure that if they don't vote for cloture it's because they care about their future with their corporate backers more than their standing in the party. (This idea of a silent filibuster is ridiculous and Reid should be pilloried if he allows it.)
I'm not as concerned about a strong public option bill coming out of the senate. I think that Reid needs something that can get the sixty votes with or without Snowe, opt-in opt-out, trigger--whatever it takes--and then when the senate conferences with the house I think the bill that finally comes out will have a strong public option that can get 51 votes in the senate. The first step is just get it past filibuster.*
I think the momentum has shifted, and now it's just a question of how robust the public option will be. It will be up to Pelosi, Weiner, others in the house to insure that one is in the final bill. It will be up to Obama to pressure the fence-sitters in the Senate to go along with it. I think it's going to happen.
*Correction (10/24/09): In making this statement I assumed incorrectly that the conference report could not be filibustered. It's unusual, but it can be. The bill coming out of conference back to the senate needs 60 votes just as the one leaving it does. The main points stands, however. No Dem will stand with the Republicans in a filibuster. Lieberman might, though.