It's time for HHS Secretary Kathleen Sibelius to get the boot. She has to go. The roll out of the Obamacare exchanges is the worst big introduction since the maiden voyage of the Titanic. Indeed, both events seem to have had the same effect since the exchanges are currently sinking Obamacare.
In countries with a parliamentary system, the entire government would likely have to resign over a fiasco this large, but in the United States politicians get elected for fixed terms so we are stuck with the incompetent Obamacrat reign for another three plus years. Nevertheless, Sibelius is the person under Obama who was charged with managing the creation and the roll out of the exchanges. Here is just part of what we know about the subject:
1. The date of October 1, 2013 for the introduction of the exchanges was set in the Obamacare statute passed three and a half years ago in March of 2010. No one could be surprised at the deadline. No one could tell us that three and a half years was too short a time to develop, test and deploy the website.
2. The funds for website development were almost limitless. Sibelius' department spend over six hundred million dollars on the exchanges. That makes healthcare.gov the single most expensive website in the history of the universe. To put this in context, if the programmers cost one hundred dollars per hour (which is way more than likely), the money spent translates into more than 6 million man hours of work. With the average work year of 2000 hours, that comes to 3000 man-years of work. Take a moment to drink that figure in. Under Sibelius, the federal government spent more than enough to have 1000 programmers work for three years straight just to complete this website. Simply put, that means that no one could claim that there were insufficient funds for the work or that more manpower was needed.
3. There were warnings for at least the last six months that the website might not be ready on time. I read about them. I saw people talking about the problems on television. Just to make sure my memory was not faulty, I asked other people today if they recalled hearing about potential problems with the website last Spring and Summer, and they confirmed that my memory was correct. Even so, Sibelius now tells us that she had no idea prior to the moment when the exchanges went live that there would be problems with them. Again, think about this. The woman in charge of the entire effort says she had no idea that their might be problems with the rollout even though the news was full of people talking about the potential problems and the likelihood of disruptions. That claim by Sibelius is either a reprehensible direct lie to America or it is an admission of incredible incompetence.
4. Once the flaws in the exchanges became clear and it was known that most Americans could NOT get insurance through the Obamacare website, Sibelius did not sound the alarm. Instead, she actually told us that we did not have to use the exchanges. We could all just pay the fine. That's the equivalent of "Let them eat cake".
5. Three weeks and two days after the website went live, it is still riddled with errors and blockages. Just two days ago, the site went up with phony numbers for the cost of policies being sold. Things are getting worse rather than better. In all this time, Sibelius has done nothing to remedy the situation.
It is time for president Obama to take steps to try to correct the failure of the website. Otherwise his is leaving the American people in a position where millions are losing their coverage while the method they were supposed to use to get new coverage is inoperative. The net effect of Obamacare so far has been to reduce, REDUCE the number of people with insurance. This is now no longer a debate about theory. We are now dealing with the actual effect on folks of Obamacare. All those talking points about how many people will be helped can be thrown away while hundreds of thousands or millions lose their healthcare coverage. As president, Obama cannot allow this to continue.
The first step which Obama must take is to get rid of the incompetent idiot who supposedly was in charge of the effort. Sibelius has to go.
Maybe it would be good to take a moment to remember the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. At that time, president Bush first complimented the head of FEMA, but after just a few days when it became clear that FEMA was not doing a good job, Bush dumped the guy. Katrina only affect a few hundred thousand people. Obamacare affects every single American. We all no know that the website is a total fiasco. Obama has to dump Sibelius. He has to do that NOW.
In countries with a parliamentary system, the entire government would likely have to resign over a fiasco this large, but in the United States politicians get elected for fixed terms so we are stuck with the incompetent Obamacrat reign for another three plus years. Nevertheless, Sibelius is the person under Obama who was charged with managing the creation and the roll out of the exchanges. Here is just part of what we know about the subject:
1. The date of October 1, 2013 for the introduction of the exchanges was set in the Obamacare statute passed three and a half years ago in March of 2010. No one could be surprised at the deadline. No one could tell us that three and a half years was too short a time to develop, test and deploy the website.
2. The funds for website development were almost limitless. Sibelius' department spend over six hundred million dollars on the exchanges. That makes healthcare.gov the single most expensive website in the history of the universe. To put this in context, if the programmers cost one hundred dollars per hour (which is way more than likely), the money spent translates into more than 6 million man hours of work. With the average work year of 2000 hours, that comes to 3000 man-years of work. Take a moment to drink that figure in. Under Sibelius, the federal government spent more than enough to have 1000 programmers work for three years straight just to complete this website. Simply put, that means that no one could claim that there were insufficient funds for the work or that more manpower was needed.
3. There were warnings for at least the last six months that the website might not be ready on time. I read about them. I saw people talking about the problems on television. Just to make sure my memory was not faulty, I asked other people today if they recalled hearing about potential problems with the website last Spring and Summer, and they confirmed that my memory was correct. Even so, Sibelius now tells us that she had no idea prior to the moment when the exchanges went live that there would be problems with them. Again, think about this. The woman in charge of the entire effort says she had no idea that their might be problems with the rollout even though the news was full of people talking about the potential problems and the likelihood of disruptions. That claim by Sibelius is either a reprehensible direct lie to America or it is an admission of incredible incompetence.
4. Once the flaws in the exchanges became clear and it was known that most Americans could NOT get insurance through the Obamacare website, Sibelius did not sound the alarm. Instead, she actually told us that we did not have to use the exchanges. We could all just pay the fine. That's the equivalent of "Let them eat cake".
5. Three weeks and two days after the website went live, it is still riddled with errors and blockages. Just two days ago, the site went up with phony numbers for the cost of policies being sold. Things are getting worse rather than better. In all this time, Sibelius has done nothing to remedy the situation.
It is time for president Obama to take steps to try to correct the failure of the website. Otherwise his is leaving the American people in a position where millions are losing their coverage while the method they were supposed to use to get new coverage is inoperative. The net effect of Obamacare so far has been to reduce, REDUCE the number of people with insurance. This is now no longer a debate about theory. We are now dealing with the actual effect on folks of Obamacare. All those talking points about how many people will be helped can be thrown away while hundreds of thousands or millions lose their healthcare coverage. As president, Obama cannot allow this to continue.
The first step which Obama must take is to get rid of the incompetent idiot who supposedly was in charge of the effort. Sibelius has to go.
Maybe it would be good to take a moment to remember the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. At that time, president Bush first complimented the head of FEMA, but after just a few days when it became clear that FEMA was not doing a good job, Bush dumped the guy. Katrina only affect a few hundred thousand people. Obamacare affects every single American. We all no know that the website is a total fiasco. Obama has to dump Sibelius. He has to do that NOW.
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