was that it was recognized very early that they didn't have the votes for a public option or single payer at the time. The blue dogs made it very clear they would not vote for that, and the congressional republicans at the time vowed it would be President Obama's "Waterloo", and there would not be ANY republicans voting for it. With that environment, and a very limited window of opportunity to get something passed or have nothing, the genius of the Obama administration was to build the foundation of the Heritage Foundation plan. While it has issues, and yes there was a lot of frustration from the more liberal members of the party, especially since the insurance industry signed onto it, what was missed by some was that it set things up to get the foot in the door.
I remember debates here at DU where some were arguing either single payer, or nothing at all. If that approach was taken, it would have been nothing at all. So right now we have millions of people who couldn't get insurance before who are now covered, but most perhaps the most important thing that it did was set the following stake in the ground. Any future healthcare proposals had better equal or exceed what the ACA covers, or there is going to be a major backlash.