Obamacare Site Up...Still A Mess

Well, the Thanksgiving weekend has come and gone. People have now turned their attention to shopping for Christmas. And so, the Obamacare website, that debuted over the weekend, couldn't have come close to competing against Amazon.com or Ebay. As it was, there was a steady increase in November of people signing up for healthcare, but not nearly enough to make it work.

Error messages, the bane of the rollout, have dropped from 6% in October to less than 1% now. Of course, that means that you still have a chance of getting bounced. The site that could only accommodate 1,100 people at a time 40 days ago, can now handle a whopping 50,000 at a time! Let's shut down the government and celebrate!

There have been over 100,000 people that have "selected" a plan on the Obamacare website. That's about 700,000 fewer than the administration needed. So why the celebration in Washington? It's because they "met their deadline", which was self-imposed, of December 1st for a re-launch date.

Why should the American public be up in arms over this whole debacle? Because the website has cost you and me over $600,000,000. That's many times more than Amazon or Ebay paid to get a website up and running that is infinitely better. What do we have to show for the money spent? Yeah. Not a lot.

That's my whole point when it comes to the government's involvement in healthcare. I think Ronald Reagan had it best. If you can open up the yellow pages, and find a heading in there, the government shouldn't be involved in it. Amen brother Reagan!

I spent about 30 years of my life living in Toledo, Ohio. It was a really nice city when I moved in. Then something happened. The unions took over. It was slowly at first, but it was steady. Now, you can't get elected to anything there unless the unions are behind you. And what happened to the city? What was once home to seven Fortune 500 companies, is home to none. What was once a thriving and growing metropolis, is dying, just like Detroit. What once was a city that was vibrant and exciting is always trying to cut it's debt so it doesn't break Ohio law. And it's the unions' fault.

Liberals (and I include unions in on this one) have yet to figure out that government shouldn't compete with the private sector for two reasons. Number one, it's wrong to compete against a business that is thriving and paying taxes to you because if you win, you're cutting off your nose to spite your face. Number two is the simple fact that government does not do well when it tries to run a business.

What happened in Toledo was a former mayor (the guy that wanted to move deaf people close to the airport so the jet noise wouldn't bother them!), took a storage garage and turned it into an entertainment venue. It competed with several private-sector businesses, but not well. It lost money every single year. And it hurt the businesses it was competing against because it did snag some business away from them. End analysis? It was losing taxpayer dollars hand over fist, and the for-profit enterprises had their legs cut out from under them. Stupid move Mr. Mayor!

So, along comes Obamacare and it's wonderful new website. And it's already run into troubles, but nowhere near the troubles that it's going to when this thing really takes off next year. It will be a bottomless pit, draining the economy of more than 16% of it's money due to waste, inefficiencies, and fraud and abuse. Already, some of the money that was supposed to go to Obamacare through additional taxes has been taken off the table. More will follow. But the costs of Obamacare haven't even started their meteoric rise yet. Wait until the "young and healthy" decide they're not going to buy into this thing. At that point, premiums will increase tremendously. Of course, then no one will be able to afford the premiums and will scream. Will that be the end of Obamacare? Sadly, no.

The Democrats in Congress, who are already running scared from this train-wreck, will try to "fix" the problem by taking it out of the hands of the insurance companies (ruining an entire industry), and will settle on the single payer option that was left out at Obamacare's inception. That means everything will be paid by the government. That's when the economy slides into a world-wide depression and the US defaults on it's debt. We simply can't afford this program. It's too big of a bite out of our budget.

Besides....do you REALLY want the government that has screwed up Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security telling you through their IPAB board, what you and your doctor have to do to make you well? (Remember Obama saying it's cheaper to give grandma a pill than expensive surgery? It's coming to that!)

It's time to really wake up and let these people in Washington know that we're not going to take this crap any longer. When a bunch of people flood the phones of Senators and Representatives, it becomes clear to them they will lose their seat and their power. That means everything to them. Call them (both GOP and Democrat) and let them know if they don't get this thing taken care of now, they're gone next year. Trust me. It's the only language these people understand.

Hopefully, it won't be too late!