TECH SURGE: Barack Obama Bring in Tech Best & Brightest to Fix Obamacare Web Site (Healthcare.gov) After Already Costing Tax Payers $634 Million

Welcome to what government considers a glitch … Did Obama use “dumb and dumber” to create Healthcare.gov?

The Obamacare rollout has been nothing short of a joke and a colossal failure. After 3 years and wasting $634 million of tax payer’s money, the Obama administration is now saying that they are bringing in the “best and brightest” to fix the Obamacare website problems. Does that mean that for $634 million, President Barack Obama and HHS Sec. Katheen Sebelius did not use the best and brightest to create this boondoogle in the first place? It really begs the question, just what did tax payers pay for and who’s decision was it to hire the folks and oversee this project. After weeks of continual issues where individuals could not log on to the web site or create accounts, the Obama administration finally had to admit that there were more than just glitches and had to bring in outside help to fix the problems.

President Barack Obama is supposed to come out today and express his frustration with the Obamacare rollout. He was so concerned and upset by the Obamacare failures that he went golfing again over the weekend. Of course look for Obama to blame Republicans for the delays because they fought against Obamacare and continue to do so. The question that needs to be asked is how did Obama and Sebelius allow Healthcare.gov to open on the date they originally planned rather than actually having the site beta tested to see if it even worked properly? Only the government is allowed such colossal failures. If this was private business, you have one chance to make a first marketing impression.

Over the past two and a half weeks, millions of Americans visited HealthCare.gov to look at their new health care options under the Affordable Care Act. In that time, nearly half a million applications for coverage have been submitted from across the nation. This tremendous interest – with over 19 million unique visits to date to HealthCare.gov– confirms that the American people are looking for quality, affordable health coverage, and want to find it online.

Unfortunately, the experience on HealthCare.gov has been frustrating for many Americans.  Some have had trouble creating accounts and logging in to the site, while others have received confusing error messages, or had to wait for slow page loads or forms that failed to respond in a timely fashion. The initial consumer experience of HealthCare.gov has not lived up to the expectations of the American people. We are committed to doing better.

Aside from the difficulties since launching the site, there are parts of the overall system that have proved up to the task.  The “Data Hub,” component, which provides HealthCare.gov with information that aids in determining eligibility for qualified health plans, is working.  Individuals have been able to verify their eligibility for credits, enabling them to shop for and enroll in low or even no-cost health plans.

The site was open for mere seconds in the Obamacare rollout and it experienced many serious issues. But what else would you expect from Obamacare, the federal government and a healthcare takeover, that a majority of Americans did not want named after Barack Obama?

To ensure that we make swift progress, and that the consumer experience continues to improve, our team has called in additional help to solve some of the more complex technical issues we are encountering.

Our team is bringing in some of the best and brightest from both inside and outside government to scrub in with the team and help improve HealthCare.gov.  We’re also putting in place tools and processes to aggressively monitor and identify parts of HealthCare.gov where individuals are encountering errors or having difficulty using the site, so we can prioritize and fix them.  We are also defining new test processes to prevent new issues from cropping up as we improve the overall service and deploying fixes to the site during off-peak hours on a regular basis.

Most importantly, we want to hear from you, and make sure that your experience with HealthCare.gov is a positive one.  If you have any comments, either complimentary or critical, please let us know by sharing your feedback at https://www.healthcare.gov/connect/.  We’ve already heard so many stories of individuals getting health insurance for the first time, and we are dedicated to making that possible for all Americans.

On Saturday, the administration announced that 476,000 people had applied for insurance through the site. However, HHS did not announce how many of those people had successfully been enrolled. The 400K+ number is hardly the number that will eventually enroll. One has to apply in order to see the prices. Also, many individuals had to create multiple accounts because of the glitches.

UPDATE I: Barack Obama plans ObamaCare damage control and most certain spin today in presser.