As I told Rick Klein and David Chalian on TopLine yesterday, if you don’t think the endangered Freshmen and Sophomores in the House are driving the car right now, think again. Remember that magic number of 39 Democratic votes needed to join with the Republican for a majority? Well, that’s how many Freshmen and Sophomores were willing to ban together in the “oust Rangel” effort — rather than have the issue hung around their necks as a millstone in 2010:

Joe Crowley, an ally of Rangel who has also played a leadership role at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, is leading the whip count efforts on Rangel, acting as a go-between between the vulnerable freshman and sophomore Democrats, on the one hand, and Rangel and Democratic leadership on the other.

They were willing to buck leadership to oust the Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee to keep their seats.

Think about that.

Rangel has been dogged by long-simmering ethics investigations and charges that he violated house rules. GOP House members have vowed to bring a resolution to the floor calling for the Harlem Democrat’s removal as chairman. When CBC member Arthur Davis and 13 other Democratic representatives called on Rangel to step aside earlier today, leadership no doudt feared that additional defections in this election year could push the resolution over the top. Rangel and Speaker Pelosi met earlier this evening, where it is believed Rangel agreed to step aside.

With three more days to go, an ultimate agreement seems a tall order. But the President is fully engaged in these final negotiations, and whatever comes out will bear his stamp.

In a brief moment of pushback against the notion that the merged bill would have to mirror the Senate’s legislation, Charlie Rangel, the Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, said that the final legislation would “have to get 218 votes too,” referring to the threshold to pass legislation in the House. Pelosi would only say that the final product would have to ensure affordability for the middle class, accountability for insurance companies and accessibility to health care for all, and that there were many routes to get to that goal, one she says the House and Senate bills share. On the public option, she said its goal was to hold insurance companies accountable, and that “there are other ways to do that, and we look forward to those discussions.”

I’ve been casting around for suggestions from people I trust about what kind of a platform we should ask Medicare for All candidates to agree upon. We want to avoid the problem we have right now — people like Charles Rangel who are cosponsors of H.R. 676 until it doesn’t matter. I’m sure the $1.4 million he’s taken from insurance interests has nothing to do with it.

Here are the initial suggestions. Please add yours in the comments.