Please take a minute out of whatever you're doing to look at this bar graph:

The very simplicity and directness of the public option is its biggest political liability. It's a little too obvious that creating a new health insurance program would harm private insurers. The Lewin Group calculates that if, as Obama proposed during the campaign, large employers were excluded from participating in the plan, then private insurers would lose about 19 percent of their customers. If large employers were not excluded—and I see no logical reason why they should be—then private insurers would lose about 70 percent of their customers. To my mind, private insurers would be left with a solid boutique market (51 million people) for which they ought to be grateful. But, of course, private insurers can't abide that possibility and will likely do everything in their power to eliminate the public option from health care reform.