Good news from ABC News' Jonathan Karl. It boils down to this: Harry Reid will include the public option in the Senate health care bill, and then allow moderate Democrats to vote for cloture on amendment aimed at stripping the option from the bill. That amendment won't get sixty votes, and those moderates, having expressed their opposition on the record through their amendment vote, will then vote for cloture on the final bill, getting it to sixty. Karl says Democratic sources have told him that,

Reid needs 60 votes to pass a health care bill and there are simply not 60 Senators who support a public option.  But Reid is now convinced that Democratic critics of the public option will support him when it counts - on the procedural motion, which requires 60 votes, to defeat a certain GOP-led filibuster of the bill.  Once the filibuster is beaten, it only takes 51 votes to pass the bill.

And Democratic critics of the public option would get a chance to go on-the-record with their opposition by voting for an amendment to strip it from the health care bill.  Under Senate rules, such an amendment would need 60 votes to pass.  And while there may not be 60 votes in favor of a public option, there are also not 60 votes against it.  So, it would remain in the bill.

The downside:  The move would almost certainly cost Democrats the support of Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME), the sole Republican who now supports Democratic health care reform efforts.  Asked today if she would vote to block a bill with public option, Snowe told reporters, "On the public option? I'd say I'm against a public option, so yes."

Another important point: Reid's version of the public option is different from the more liberal version advocated by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi in two key ways:  1) Reid's version would allow individual states to opt-out of the program, giving public option critics the chance to say that their states retain the right to scrap the idea; and, 2) Under Reid's plan, the new government insurance program would have to negotiate payment rates with health care providers.

Having spent the morning dealing with obscene headaches related to my own COBRA insurance, I am relieved to get a dose of good news, even if it does unnecessarily legitimize the tenthers.