Salon debunks the initial reporting about Senator Conrad's pledge to vote against a "government-run" healthcare system:
The Sun's story never quoted Conrad directly about the public option, and the senator's communications director, Sean Neary, told Salon that the story was inaccurate. Conrad has been telling his constituents that he won't let the government run their health care, which may be the cause of the confusion, but that language doesn't preclude the public option.
As I wrote in the comments, when President Obama said in New Hampshire that he doesn't support "death panels," that doesn't mean President Obama is dropping his support for voluntary end-of-life counseling. Likewise, just because Conrad said he doesn't support a "government-run healthcare system," doesn't mean he's not going to vote for the public option.
The lesson, at this point, is to not take some of these quotes at face value. It's just too early and there's too much maneuvering going on. When the final bills go to conference committee, that's when we should probably start taking vote pledges more seriously.