Maybe House Republicans will want to reconsider the foundational premise of their shutdown: hating on Obamacare. How many times have you heard a Republican say they are standing with the American people who don't want Obamacare? Well, the millions of Americans who have
overwhelmed exchange websites in just the first 12 hours of the exchanges being open would argue.
New York has had more than 2 million visitors this morning, which is causing some trouble for people trying to sign up. To put that in perspective, New York has 2.5 million uninsured residents. [...]
Kentucky's new marketplace, the Kynect, had processed over 1,000 applications for insurance by 9:30 a.m. this morning. The Web site has had more than 24,000 visits from people browsing the insurance rates.
Connecticut's exchange site and phone lines have been humming:
Stats:We logged 10,000 visitors in the last 3 hours. 22 enrollments so far. Make sure your browser is updated if you are having problems!
— @AccessHealthCT
More enrollments through the Call center! More families and individuals getting the coverage they need!
— @AccessHealthCT
The federal site, where people from the 36 states that refused to set up their own exchanges will be signing up, has been
deluged by requests. More than one million people hit the federal exchange site, HealthCare.gov, in the past 24 hours, "five times more users than ever have been on the Medicare.gov website at one time." That's put a strain on the site, and for many it hasn't worked. Likewise, the phone lines have been overwhelmed.
The glitches that the administration warned would be inevitable, that Republicans have been pre-gloating about for weeks so far, all come down to the primary glitch of our broken health care system: overwhelming pent-up demand for affordable health insurance, available to everyone.
