Conservative columnist Michelle Malkin wrote in Townhall last week that the ObamaCare exchanges are, unsurprisingly, flailing.
“Almost half of Obamacare exchanges face financial struggles in the future,” The Washington Post reported last week. The news comes despite $5 billion in federal taxpayer subsidies for IT vendors, call centers and all the infrastructure and manpower needed to prop up the showcase government health insurance entities. Initially, the feds ran 34 state exchanges; 16 states and the District of Columbia set up their own.
While private health insurance exchanges have operated smoothly and satisfied customers for decades, the Obamacare models are on life support. Oregon’s exchange is six feet under — shuttered last year after government overseers squandered $300 million on their failed website and shady consultants who allegedly set up a phony website to trick the feds. The FBI and the U.S. HHS inspector general’s office reportedly have been investigating the racket for more than a year now.
… As health care analyst Phil Kerpen of the free market group American Commitment points out, Massachusetts “already had a functioning state health exchange” but “after receiving $179 million from federal taxpayers” to reconstitute it under Obamacare, “they were able to break that existing exchange beyond repair.” An amazing feat.
The President’s health care law has been a disaster since Day One, with government officials insisting we must “pass the bill before we see what’s in it.” Since then, we’ve gotten broken websites, dropped coverage plans, increased premiums, failed systems to enforce the individual mandate, mismanaged spending, and even corruption.
I think Ronald Reagan said it best when he quipped, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”
