By Jeff Crouere
Saturday, October 26, 2013
On Monday, at the Rose Garden, as the President was
endlessly talking about his signature program, Obamacare, a young woman
standing behind him nearly fainted. The victim of the long winded President,
Karmel Allison, has diabetes and is 20 weeks pregnant. It is mind boggling that
the White House would force someone in her condition to stand and endure an
Obama speech. Unfortunately, for the President, his entire speech was
overshadowed by the drama on stage. Instead of a well choreographed
presentation of the wonderful aspects of Obamacare it was another disaster for
this ill fated program.
In fact, the staging strategy for the President's speech
was as well planned as the Obamacare roll out. It has been over three weeks
into Obamacare and Americans still do not know how many enrollees have
successfully navigated this glitch riddled website. While many Americans have
wasted an entire day trying to log on to the website, others have been placed
on hold for hours on the program's hotline.
Some experts have called for the entire website to be
scrapped, while others have predicted that millions of lines of code will have
to be replaced.
Needless to say, this debacle demonstrates once again
that government is incapable of operating any program efficiently. The Obama
administration successfully passed the Affordable Care Act in March of 2010,
squeaking out a narrow, partisan victory in Congress. Knowing that so many
Americans were uncomfortable with Obamacare, it would have made sense for the
administration to present a flawless launch for the program on October 1.
Instead, despite over 42 months of preparation, the roll out has been a
nightmare. In fact, contractors have now admitted that the final testing for
the site only began in mid-September. Once that failed, the President should
have been notified immediately and the program's launch should have been
delayed. Instead, Obama was supposedly shielded from the truth and the launch
date was not changed.
This program has been placed under the umbrella of the
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Many in Congress are demanding
answers from HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, while others, such as Congressman
John Fleming (R-LA) are calling for her resignation. After first ducking
Congress, Sebelius has finally agreed to appear next week for what is surely
going to be a confrontational exchange.
It is so bad that Democrats and the White House and now
hinting that a delay in the individual mandate will be forthcoming. This is
what Republicans were asking for in the budget debate, but the President
refused the supposedly outrageous demand. Ironically, Democrats may eventually
have to relent to the delay after realizing that Americans cannot be penalized
for not buying health insurance on an exchange that does not work.
It is such a disaster that, after three weeks, New York,
among other states, can boast almost no enrollees. In other regions of the
country, such as Louisiana, states are providing consumers very few, if any,
health insurance options. The President claimed his plan would offer lower
prices and plenty of options for Americans. In reality, Americans are losing
healthcare coverage due to Obamacare, premiums are rising rapidly and options
are dwindling.
In just two states, Florida and California, 460,000
people who buy their own insurance have been dropped by their providers. These
unfortunate souls will be forced to use healthcare exchanges that do not work.
Clearly, in the first few weeks of Obamacare, the
President's program has created more uninsured Americans. It is no surprise
that experts predict that 30 million Americans will still be uninsured by 2016.
So, a program that will cost trillions of dollars,
takeover our health care industry, and drive private insurers out of business
will ultimately fail in its basic mission to provide insurance to the
uninsured.
No wonder Ms. Allison fainted on Monday. In the uncertain
days ahead, Obamacare will cast a fainting spell on untold millions of victims.
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