Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) has never been a fan of the public option. We now know that she is actively working to kill the public option with help of Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and, of course, the trigger.

“What we have to move forward thinking about is, as the president has said, people keeping what they have if they like it, having more choices, reforming the private market,” Landrieu said. “And if we can achieve that through private-sector reform, that’s wonderful. And if not, then there should be a mechanism that basically, I guess, guarantees it, which would be a well-crafted trigger.”

Given Snowe’s and Landrieu’s extreme opposition to the idea of a real public option, we know a “well-crafted trigger” must mean one that is designed to never be pulled. Snowe’s original trigger amendment was crafted in a way to insure that it was never pulled. This should not be surprising. Snowe has repeatedly stated that she is so strongly against a real public option that she would filibuster the bill she helped write if it included one. She claims her inspiration for the public option trigger is the public plan trigger in Medicare Part D, which, guess what, has never been pulled.

The trigger is not a compromise. It is not the threat of a public option. It is not the possibility of a public option. It is not an eventual public option. It is nothing more than a ruse to pretend that they did not completely kill the public option.

Democratic Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu is out as keynote speaker for the Palm Beach County Democratic Party’s annual fund-raising dinner next week because party leaders dislike her stance on health care reform, county Democratic Chairman Mark Alan Siegel said today.

Landrieu, a moderate who recently described herself as “extremely concerned about a government-run, taxpayer-funded, national public plan,” has not committed to voting to cut off a likely Republican filibuster and forcing a vote on the legislation.

Democrats need 60 votes to invoke “cloture” and force a vote.

“We just didn’t want to have a keynote speaker who’s not committed to cloture. It would have just been wrong,” said Siegel, who said party higher-ups and rank-and-file members had voiced displeasure with the choice of Landrieu as a keynoter.

Landrieu’s office couldn’t be reached this morning.

The Democrats’ annual dinner — formerly known as the Jefferson-Jackson dinner but this year rebranded as the Truman-Kennedy-Johnson dinner — is Nov. 14 at the Palm Beach County Convention Center.

Asked who will be the keynoter now, Siegel said, “We’re working on that.”