Last week it was polling from the Wall Street Journal and NBC showing that a broad majority of Americans believe a public option should be included in any health reform package. Now polling from the New York Times and CBS backs them up:

Americans overwhelmingly support substantial changes to the health care system and are strongly behind one of the most contentious proposals Congress is considering, a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

Some of the striking numbers from the NYT/CBS poll:

• 72% of all respondents favored inclusion of a public option; only 20% oppose it. Even 50% of those identifying themselves as Republicans supported including a public option.
• 57% said that they would be willing to pay higher taxes to provide truly universal health care. Among those earning less than $50,000/year, the percentage who were willing was even higher — 64%.
• 50% said that they believe the government would do a better job providing medical coverage than private insurance companies do; 59% said they believe government would do better holding down costs than private insurance companies do.

These are not “narrowly divided” numbers; they are landslide numbers. When was the last time you saw a poll where a majority of people supported their own taxes going up? And yet, on this question, that majority exists.

Listening to our leaders debate on this issue, though, you’d think this widespread consensus didn’t exist. For instance, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina — member of the Senate Budget Committee and Robin to John McCain’s Batman — went on Sunday’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos to declare that a public option will never pass the U.S. Senate:

STEPHANOPOULOS: On the issues of taxes to pay for health care, on the issue of a public health insurance plan. But let me show you this “New York Times” poll that’s just out this morning showing 72 percent, 72 percent of the public supports a government health insurance plan and 57 percent of the public is willing to pay more taxes for universal health care. They seem to be ready for the kind of change that Republicans are fighting.

GRAHAM: Well, it’s just not Republicans, George. The reason you’re not going to have a government run health care pass the Senate is because it would be devastating for this country. The last thing in the world I think Democrats and Republicans are going to do at the end of the day is create a government run health care system where you’ve got a bureaucrat standing in between the patient and the doctor…

We do need to deal with inflation in health care, private and public inflation, but we’re not going to go down to the government owning health care road in America and I think that’s the story of this week. There’s been a bipartisan rejection of that.

Stephanopoulos then turned to his other guest, Democratic Senator Chris Dodd of Connecticut, and urged him to give up his crazy dreams of a public option in favor of something “bipartisan”:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Now Senator Dodd, I think that Senator Graham talked about the public there. We just saw that hole. But his read of the Senate seems pretty accurate right now. You have not only Republicans but several of your Democratic colleagues, including the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Baucus saying the public option isn’t going to fly in their committee. They want something bipartisan and that can’t include this public health insurance option.

To his credit, Dodd pushed back:

DODD: Well, again, I’m delighted to hear Lindsey talk about the possibility of having something like a co-op and non-profits. I happen to support a public option, I don’t think you can bring down costs without it. If there isn’t some competition out there to drive down the overall cost — costs have gone up 86 percent since ‘96, 1996. Forty-five percent might stay the loan, increase in health care cost. The American average working family can’t afford this. A family of four now it’s $12,000. We’re being told in 20 years, it could be half the gross income of a family spent on health care premiums. That is just unacceptable.

What amazes me in this exchange is that Stephanopoulos puts Dodd on the defensive, as if he’s some kind of wild-eyed dreamer building castles in the sky, while treating Graham as the sensible one. But Chris Dodd is advocating a policy that three-quarters of the public — a stunning level of support for any proposal in a democratic society — wants to see enacted. Graham’s opposition puts him in line with only 20% of the public.

And yet the Conventional Wisdom is that a proposal is not “bipartisan” or “centrist” enough unless it satisfies that 20% — even if that means leaving the rest of the nation out in the cold.

Why? Because the 20% includes the insurance industry:

Perhaps no idea is more disliked by the U.S. health insurance industry than a proposal by Democratic President-elect Barack Obama to have a public health insurance plan competing directly with them as part of his broad pledge to reform the country”s ailing health care system.

The [health insurance] industry is “going to fight and they”re going to kick and they”re going to scream,” said Sam Fleet, president and chief executive officer of AmWins Group Benefits, a wholesale brokerage. “The last thing private insurers want is the federal government to compete with them.”

… and for many (most?) Senators, their vote is, apparently, worth quite a bit more than yours is.

More than yours, mine and your best friend’s put together, in fact.