The public option will be cheaper than mandatory private insurance and folks can still add on private insurance if they want, or, hopefully, just pay extra for more care, and likely, it means less government control of a person's private life.

It will be cheaper because to fund insurers covering pre existing conditions, treatment already being received, even if rates are drastically increased taxes will also need to be increased to supplement private insurance if private insurers have to cover pre existing conditions. The closer looks at the Massachusetts plan that the Kennedy-Dodd bill is modeled after with mandatory private insurance, which has been a dramatic, colossal failure that everyone hates, has shown this, as has the insurance industry's own report, bent on stopping all health care reform, which inadvertently has led to some politicians finally looking at the public option, which is the only sensible way (yep, I'm biased).

Why won't the public option be as invasive as mandatory private insurance? Because the government really will save money if less people use services, so hopefully less "mental health care," and also a broken leg will no longer bankrupt someone.