They sometimes mentioned a public option, but it was never central to either Obama's or Hillary's pitch.

See here for an evaluation of Obama on the issue: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/dec/... It was included in his platform, but as an "also, too" kind of thing. And if you took your evaluation of his position from what he said on the stump, you'd never have known it was in his platform at all.

(I'm omitting Edwards from this discussion because he flamed out so early.)