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Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Not the right kind of legacy

Apparently the President is claiming to not have been fully aware of the technical challenges facing the Affordable Care Act website.  All's well and good and I am sure Rep Darrell "Car Alarm" Issa is wetting himself out of  sheer glee over the AFA's technotastrophy.  Stripping away the culture of Washington DC political theater for a moment though, one thing is absolutely true: the President was either not paying attention to the briefings he was receiving about AFA website issues OR he wasn't receiving any briefings.  Pick your poison, because either choice spells poor leadership on the part of the President.

Let's not lose sight of the fact that the AFA is supposed to be the President's legacy.  His "signature piece" of legislation.  If ever there was a time to be paying attention, it was right before the launch of the website.  We, being the American taxpayers expect, and deserve better from our elected leadership and in this case the President failed us.

What's next? Well I am sure that Washington DC Republicans will continue to feign outrage over a program they don't like not working anyway. I am also sure that eventually this mess will be cleaned up and the website will eventually work. However what we actually need is leadership and accountability, and in this case both of those items can only come from the President.  Not from some Brian-dead Canuck technology company.  Not the HHS Secretary.

2 comments:

Mike Sporer said...

Agreed Steve! Leadership lacking on many fronts.

Stephen Albert said...

Thanks for commenting Mike. I'm not sure which I find more distasteful: the administration dodging and weaving or the Republicans pretending that the are actually upset over the website failure.