A few days ago I was speaking to some folks on the inside of the effort to get HealthCare.gov working. Their take on the much-discussed Post piece stating that the site was likely not to be ready by December 1st was that it mistook how any site works. Not that it was wrong per se but was too binary in its take. It’s not like a car where you put your key in the ignition and it starts or it doesn’t. It’s an inherently incremental and iterative process – which at least as a general matter is true with any website, large or small, especially large.
The piece out in the Post today is another case of a headline giving a somewhat misleading view not only of the reality of the situation, but even what’s contained in the piece itself.
There was an upset win in the runoff to fill the vacant seat in Louisiana’s 5th Congressional District last night. Jindal-backed favorite and party regular state Sen. Neil Riser (R) was defeated by newcomer Vance McAllister (R). In national political terms this sounds like a bit of a yawner since this was a run-off between two Republicans. But there’s a big element of the result that runs counter to the current political narrative on ‘Obamacare’.
ICYMI: Six gobsmacking new details from the Rob Ford police report document dump.
Not all fun and games and crack and prostitutes. On a much more serious note, police suspected Mayor Ford was beating his wife.
I want to be clear not to endorse this. And it’s definitely not a replacement for HealthCare.gov. But a few guys out in San Francisco have put together something called thehealthsherpa.com, which really quickly tells you what policies are available in your area, what subsidies you are entitled to based on your income and who to call or what site to go to buy the actual coverage. From what I can tell it seems to be the work not of a commercial entity or even an organization, but just some very public-spirited programmers.
Now we hear from ACA “loser” TPM Reader BW …
Since it’s been estimated that about 3% of the US population will end up “losers” under Obamacare, I thought I’d write in and give you my perspective as a 3-percenter. However, I suspect that I belong to a smaller subset of the 3%, that being people who find it appallingly self-indulgent and shamefully self-pitying to think of ourselves as losers.
House Dems insist their legislative fix to Obamacare is totally different from Obama’s own attempted fix. Here’s more on today’s vote on the separate House GOP proposal.
TPM Reader TZ, an ACA supporter with a very vested interest in the program succeeding, tells us he’s at the end of his tether …
So, I have a huge vested interest in ACA working out. I am self-employed (as a consultant, laid off from pharma two years ago) and when our COBRA at company rates ran out 18 months ago I went onto the open market and sought insurance for me and my family (wife and two kids). Aetna refused to cover me because I am overweight (zoftig!). So, I had to stay on my company insurance but paying full freight, while my wife and kids went onto a crappy Aetna plan. So, one family, two plans. We also purchased dental on our own, it’s not very good, but its not great either. It’s a pain to have the family on two different plans.
A fascinating look at the hundreds of thousands of letters Jackie Kennedy received in the immediate aftermath of her husbands assassination. They take us back behind the veil of nostalgia and conspiracy theory to a country united in mourning but already fractured over the civil rights movement and its possible role in Kennedy’s murder.
There are actually right-wing groups paying big money to convince young people in Alaska not to sign up for health insurance.