It is perhaps too hopeful to believe that national health insurance is dead. But it is becoming increasingly clear that the dreaded "public option" which would create a government run health insurance system to compete with private insurers may be dying an ignoble death.Mike Allen and Jim Vandehei of Politico report: Top White House advisers, especially Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, are still privately predicting massive changes to the health care system in 2009. But for the first time, Democrats on Capitol Hill and in the administration are expressing frank worries about stronger-than-expected opposition from moderate Democrats and worse-than-expected estimates for how much the plan could cost. Business groups, which had embraced the idea of reform and have been meeting quietly with Democrats for months in an effort to shape the legislation, now talk of spending millions of dollars to oppose the latest proposals out of Capitol Hill. And Democrats themselves are not united,...(Read Full Post)