Opt-out Option Looking Promising!

It's looking like the unified Senate bill will have the opt-out plan that got me so excited earlier, which is great news. Besides giving the states the option to participate or not, it looks like the public plan would be run by a non-profit board:

We ought to have a non-profit board--it could be appointed by the President but a non profit board. They'd have to retain earnings, create a retained earnings pool, so that if they run into financial problems later on the financial needs of the plan could be met by the retained earnings, not by the federal government.
- Sen. Carper (D-DE)

This is the kind of nuance that needs to be quickly shown to those on the fence. The greatest concern, I believe, is that a public option would require more spending by the federal government. In an age of TARP, bailouts, upcoming energy and banking regulations, and a deficit of historic proportions, fiscal responsibility has become an ultimate tipping point for the plan.
The CBO (our non-partisan price-tagging office) report, of course, said that the Senate Finance Committee bill would pay for itself and even yield a $81 billion surplus, but if the addition of a public option could be insulated from federal coffers that would put many people at ease. To be able to assure constituents that their Medicare benefits and our financial stability are secure would be a great help. America's Libertarian culture is pervasive, but not all-encompassing. There are some folks out there that object strongly just on principal of government interference, but I think the majority of the opposition could be convinced through arguments of common sense cost-effectiveness.
Here's to the battle ahead.