Short Takes: Politics and the Public Option

The Senate Finance Committee has just voted down a proposal by Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) that would have amended the health care bill to include a public option. Five Democrats -- Sens. Max Baucus (Mont.) Kent Conrad (N.D.), Blanche Lincoln (Ark.), Bill Nelson (Fla.) and Tom Carper (Del.) -- voted against the Rockefeller amendment. President Barack Obama's average percentage of the 2008 vote in those states was 49.4 percent. The eight Senate Democrats who voted for the Rockefeller amendment...