> you can't blame one voter for a lost ballot

You can't do this in popular elections but you can absolutely do it in the legislature where everyone has a different constituency, policy portfolio, campaign contribution history, etc. Lieberman wouldn't vote for a bill with a public option, full stop. The math worked out such that Lieberman was necessary. Ergo, Lieberman killed the public option if there was no other Senator for whom the existence of a public option would have changed their Nay to a Yea. There was not, so you can absolutely lay the lack of a present day public option for health care in the US at his feet.

I think you're letting Congress as a whole off to easy by scapegoating one senator. A more bipartisan bill that included a few Republicans could have been passed instead.

No such bill existed. You might as well say that things would have been different if there were leprechaun senators.

> A more bipartisan bill that included a few Republicans could have been passed instead.

Assumes facts not in evidence, notably that there is any bill oriented to the policy objectives the ACA sought to acheive that Republican Senators would have supported at that time, and (for relevance regarding the responsibility for the absence of a public option in the ACA) that such a bill would include a public option of the type Lieberman opposed.

I can and will blame one voter for a lost ballot. Republicans controlled 40 seats. Democrats controlled 58 and had two independents who mostly leaned their way. They needed all 60 of those votes to pass something. Lieberman was one of those independents, and he explicitly threatened to filibuster any bill that included a public option, while the other 59 accepted it.

Republicans were going to vote against the ACA no matter what it contained. That means they had no power over the content of what got passed. Lieberman had huge power over the content.

No faction should force through a marginally popular, sweeping change by the skin of it's teeth.

This is one of the reasons why the Constitution and amendment process exist. The Supreme Court ruled that the passage of the ACA was technically OK (I disagree, but that's moot I guess) but they didn't rule whether it was wise.

I'm saying given the political and practical mess on this issue, it was unwise. I think partisan finger pointing is likewise a bad idea.

60% shouldn't be considered "skin of its teeth" and historically wasn't. It only is now because the Senate has become fairly dysfunctional.

I don't see how it's "partisan finger pointing" to explain why the lack of a public option is the responsibility of a single independent senator. It vaguely fits for stating that the 40 Republicans were never going to vote for any form of the ACA, but that's really just a statement of fact.