Reply #17: BS, it's a totally different scenario.

[ContinentalOp]

You can't "naderize" an issue like this because it's not like there's an either/or, two sided vote that the public gets to participate in. In other words, advocates for single payer are not siphoning votes off of the public option. That's ridiculous.

The "public plan" has been deliberately conflated with single payer as a way of taking single payer off of the table and shifting the debate to the right. I don't think it's unfair to say that Dean has played a part, intentionally or not, in that process.