Today on CBS' Face the Nation, two senior Senators, one a Democrat and the other a Republican, on the  Senate Finance Committee offered widely different assessments on how the final health care reform package would look. Not surprising, the object of their discord was the public option in the US health care reform proposals now working their way through the Senate.

Senator Chuck Schumer, the New York Democrat, was emphatic. "Make no mistake about it, the president is for this strongly. There will be a public option in the final bill." Naturally, Iowa's Republican Senator Chuck Grassley begged to differ. "The federal government is in the process of nationalizing banks, nationalizing General Motors. I'm going to make sure we don't nationalize health insurance and [the] public option is the first step to doing that," countered Senator Grassley.

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Despite the bipartisan negotiations going on behind the scenes on the Finance Committee, Schumer pointedly noted that the House and the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee have written a public option into their bills. Combined with Obama's continued support for the proposal, Schumer suggested, that bodes well for the prospects of the public option making into the final legislation the president wants on his desk this Autumn.

"The House has proposed its plan, has a strong public option. The HELP Committee, the other committee in the Senate doing this, has proposed a strong public option," Schumer said.

Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and six other committee members, including Grassley, have been meeting behind closed doors to draft a bipartisan bill. At the urging of Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), the senators are leaning toward setting aside a true public option in favor of establishing not-for-profit, member-owned health insurance cooperatives to compete with traditional insurance companies. Though the notion appeals to Republicans and some centrist Democrats, supporters of the public option do not view it as an acceptable compromise.

Schumer emerged earlier this year as a vocal proponent of the public option and offered a model for the plan that he positioned as a compromise itself. Under Schumer's proposal, which closely resembles what the House and the HELP Committee are considering, the public option would receive no federal funding, be financed entirely by premiums and have to abide by the same insurance regulations as private firms.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) reiterated on Fox News Sunday that the lower chamber's bill will include a strong public option. "We think there's going to be a public option. Yes, we think we need that. We need to make sure that there is an option available for public that can't get through at the private insurance. We think that's essential if you're going to have access," Hoyer said.

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) indicated that a public option would be a deal-breaker for Republicans. "I think having the government have a plan to compete with the private sector is unfair, because the government has no cost of capital," Boehner said.

On the other hand, the public option is our line in the sand. It's non-negotiable.

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