Nice try, Senator Durbin. But you’re wrong:
A top Senate Democrat said on Sunday that ObamaCare is “on its way to be a substantial success.”
Sen. Dick Durbin (Ill.), the No. 2 Democrat in the chamber, defended the rollout of the healthcare reform law in an appearance on “Fox News Sunday,” while noting that “it’s off to a rough start with the website.”
Critics of the law have been quick to point out problems in the website that the Obama administration launched on Oct. 1, which is designed to help consumers shop for health insurance on new marketplaces, called exchanges.
Glitches and delays at the website have prevented many users from logging on and applying for insurance, even after multiple attempts.
Substantial success? Hardly. Americans are now just finding out their premiums are doubling, they're losing coverage, and their employers are reducing their work hours. All things, of course, we saw coming. If anything, comments like these show just how out of touch some members of Congress really are.
For his part, Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri offered a sharp rebuttal to Senator Durbin’s stunning naiveté:
“I don’t think this plan will work because it’s based on a couple of premises that won’t work,” Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) replied.
“But when you can't even put together the package to sign up, that shows how big a job it is for the federal government to manage 16 percent of the economy and people’s health insurance plans. It's not where the federal government should be.”
Durbin and other defenders of the law have claimed that some of the problems with the website have been due to a surge in traffic, which they say represents intense public interest.
That may be true. But let’s not forget that the administration rolled out the official Obamacare website using antiquated technology. No wonder Americans are experiencing all sorts of technical problems. Meanwhile, Robert Gibbs recently described the rollout as “excruciatingly embarrassing,” and the president himself is reportedly very unhappy. But what did he expect would happen?
The idea that after the website is fixed everything will be A-OK is becoming harder and harder to believe. Too many families have already been negatively impacted by Obamacare, and will continue to be as long as it remains "settled law."
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