Teramis says:

And yet -- I think *any* option that stands outside the traditional health insurance complex stands to compete with it, especially because as more small businesses continue to drop or cut insurance they can no longer afford, and individuals drop out of insurance programs they can no longer afford (and this is an endemic pattern, now) -- these will also become eligible for the public option.

At the end of the day, a public option is so rigidly opposed by vested interests because it, alone, is the thing with the power to break the back of the insurance industry monoply over the American public. Almost any form of public option will ultimately achieve this, because any form is a foothold, and it is the crack in the door for future enhancements, amendments, expansions, etc. The industry is fighting tooth and claw to prevent that toehold, itself, because they know what it will portend.

So I say, to almost any form of public option: go team. It's the appropriate stick in the eye to the monopolistic insurance industry. Now in small measure, perhaps, but later, in greater (as long as progressives in Congress continue to fight for it and expand that toehold.)