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OBAMACARE: YOU HAD ONE JOB …
Oct. 21st, 2013 09:10 pmI don’t do many posts about Obamacare, for a couple of reasons:
1. I know very little about how the healthcare system works.
2. The attempts by most politicians, pundits and Facebook memes to explain to me how Obamacare is a good or a bad thing tend to be overblown and/or apocryphal. While this is generally a bipartisan issue, it’s a much bigger problem on the Republican side of the equation. (See: Sean Hannity, Ted Cruz, Michele Bachmann, etc.) Basically there’s so much misinformation being slung around on what Obamacare does or doesn’t do – often by people who don’t actually understand very much of the actual legislation – that I tend to just tune it right out.
But sometimes that backfires.
For example, when I saw some headlines about how the Heathcare.gov website was experiencing some problems, I wrote them off as more hyperbole propagated by Republicans eager to point to anything that could show Obamacare is the hopeless and utter failure they’ve alwayswanted said it would be.
Turns out it’s not quite hyperbole after all. And it’s not just Republicans declaring it a disaster.
In fact, according to HuffPo, if the HHS don't get it fixed soon, it could completely wreck Obamacare:
Ouch.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say this spells doom for Obamacare – at least not yet. But if it does, it would be a shame that the whole thing falls apart because of a crappy website.
According to some assessments, the problem isn't just the website itself but the way the govt goes about contracting big IT projects like this.
Maybe. But that’s also kind of beside the point when you realize that what we’re basically saying here is that the success of the Affordable Care Act – the signature bill of the Obama admin and the biggest landmark reform measure in a long time – hinges on a single point of failure that was in theory the easiest part to execute. I mean, it’s not like the technology to create a website that can process customer requests to buy services is beyond our capacity.
That’s assuming, of course, that the HuffPo piece isn't more hyperbole. Let’s hope it is. Because you just know the Republicans are going to crow about this all the way to the mid-terms and beyond.
And there’s no small irony in the notion that Republicans have worked so hard to do everything they could to dismantle Obamacare – to the point of shutting the govt down over it – when all they had to do was sit back and wait.
Meanwhile, I look forward to eventual claims from sites like Addicting Info that the Koch Brothers hired hackers to plant buggy JavaScript code into the Healthcare.gov site.
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This is dF
1. I know very little about how the healthcare system works.
2. The attempts by most politicians, pundits and Facebook memes to explain to me how Obamacare is a good or a bad thing tend to be overblown and/or apocryphal. While this is generally a bipartisan issue, it’s a much bigger problem on the Republican side of the equation. (See: Sean Hannity, Ted Cruz, Michele Bachmann, etc.) Basically there’s so much misinformation being slung around on what Obamacare does or doesn’t do – often by people who don’t actually understand very much of the actual legislation – that I tend to just tune it right out.
But sometimes that backfires.
For example, when I saw some headlines about how the Heathcare.gov website was experiencing some problems, I wrote them off as more hyperbole propagated by Republicans eager to point to anything that could show Obamacare is the hopeless and utter failure they’ve always
Turns out it’s not quite hyperbole after all. And it’s not just Republicans declaring it a disaster.
In fact, according to HuffPo, if the HHS don't get it fixed soon, it could completely wreck Obamacare:
Without a functioning health insurance exchange, many people too sick or too poor to get health insurance under the old rules will remain shut out of the system. The millions of Americans who already buy their own insurance will face major disruptions. Health insurance companies could experience a nightmare scenario where the bulk of the individuals who brave the frustrating sign-up process are those who are sick, desperate for coverage and expensive to treat.
And anyone who isn't able to get coverage because of the exchanges' problems could confront the prospect of tax penalties through no fault of their own.
And anyone who isn't able to get coverage because of the exchanges' problems could confront the prospect of tax penalties through no fault of their own.
Ouch.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say this spells doom for Obamacare – at least not yet. But if it does, it would be a shame that the whole thing falls apart because of a crappy website.
According to some assessments, the problem isn't just the website itself but the way the govt goes about contracting big IT projects like this.
Maybe. But that’s also kind of beside the point when you realize that what we’re basically saying here is that the success of the Affordable Care Act – the signature bill of the Obama admin and the biggest landmark reform measure in a long time – hinges on a single point of failure that was in theory the easiest part to execute. I mean, it’s not like the technology to create a website that can process customer requests to buy services is beyond our capacity.
That’s assuming, of course, that the HuffPo piece isn't more hyperbole. Let’s hope it is. Because you just know the Republicans are going to crow about this all the way to the mid-terms and beyond.
And there’s no small irony in the notion that Republicans have worked so hard to do everything they could to dismantle Obamacare – to the point of shutting the govt down over it – when all they had to do was sit back and wait.
Meanwhile, I look forward to eventual claims from sites like Addicting Info that the Koch Brothers hired hackers to plant buggy JavaScript code into the Healthcare.gov site.
503 service unavailable,
This is dF
