From leaked e-mails obtained by Media Matters, we now know FOX News was pushing GOP talking points on health reform, specifically not using the term "public option," but calling it the "government" option, or a "government-run program."

Now we know that "credit" for the terminology goes to AHIP, the health insurers with whom the White House and Sen. Max Baucus were negotiating the bill.

[T]he linguistic shift first emerged in February in research provided the GOP by the health insurance industry group America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP). AHIP focus groups from late February (whose findings appear in this document, provided by the former aide) found that voters like the idea of a "public" plan, and that the most negative term is a "government-run health insurance plan." A round of polling from AHIP in February and March confirmed that argument. "It is clear the most negative language to use when describing a 'public plan' is 'a government-run health insurance plan,'" reads a presentation the group distributed, starting in March, to allies, Republican staff and opinion leaders and to conservative media, according to the former aide.

Igor Volsky explains why this is a big deal, just in case you don't think that the corporate lobbyist/broadcast media/political party collusion in policy making is a problem.

This is fairly significant because it once again reaffirms the existence of a messaging pipeline which stretches from the industry to the lobbyist to the lawmaker and to Fox — and not necessarily in that order. The effectiveness of this communication system was on full display during the health care debate, when Republicans went to the floor and literally read from the industry-sponsored critique of the health law and then again echoed their arguments about the causes of premium increases after the law passed. None of this happened through some coincidence or a meeting of the minds. More likely than not, Republicans and their friends in the media were reading from talking points they received directly from the industry.... In his book Deadly Spin, Wendell Potter explains how this process works through the help of public relations firms and a mass distribution of information to friendly news outlets (read: Fox News) and conservative think tanks who then place favorable editorials in the country’s leading newspapers. This example deserves a prime spot in the book’s second edition, which, with some more investigative work, could contain whole treasure trove of anti-reform phrases and talking points that originated with AHIP.

With a fix like that in, that and the "understanding" the White House had with health lobbyists that the public option would not be included in the final bill, it's a testament to grassroots organizing on the left that the proposal had traction for as long as it did.