Chad’s Morning Brief: The Power of Ted Cruz, Obamacare Exchanges Are a Mess, & Other Top Stories
Here is your Morning Brief for the morning of October 2, 2013. Give me your feedback below and tune in to The Chad Hasty Show for these and many more topics from 8:30 to 11am. Remember, you can listen online at KFYO.com or on your iPhone/Android with the radioPup App.
The Power of Ted Cruz
Ted Cruz is one of the most hated politicians in Washington if you believe media reports and even what some lawmakers are saying. The Freshman Senator has no real power but you wouldn't know that from the headlines. National Review has a story about Rep. Peter King who claims that Cruz has hijacked the Republican Party.
Representative Peter King (R., N.Y.), who failed to rally moderates last night during votes, said today that if House Republicans could vote by a secret ballot, the votes would be there to end the government shutdown.
“In the House of Represenatives, right now, if we had a secret ballot clearly a majority of Republicans would vote to reopen the government and they would vote against Ted Cruz. I can tell you the anger on the floor is there,” King told Fox News host Gretchen Carlson in an interview.
“The fact is, they’re boxed in or they’re afraid of primaries,” he added.
He also referred to Cruz as a “fraud.”
“He’s hijacked the party,” King said bluntly of Cruz.
So let me get this straight. Ted Cruz who is new to the Senate scares more politicians than a moderate who has been in office for years? Hey Peter, that doesn't look good for politicians like you.
The "problem" with Ted Cruz is that he is doing exactly what he campaigned to do. He didn't campaign to make friends or to stay in office forever. He campaigned to do everything he could to get rid of Obamacare and to bring a little more freedom to the American people. If Republicans don't like that then they should be worried.
I find it funny though that no one wants to really stand up to Ted Cruz. By doing this, Republicans and the media give more power to Cruz. If they would ignore him and the moderates stand up to him, they could silence him.
Exchanges Are A Mess
Is it really surprising to anyone that the online healthcare exchanges screwed up yesterday? Come on folks! This is the government. Things are going to be screwed up from here on out when it comes to healthcare. According to CBS people flooded the websites and many experienced "glitches".
The online insurance marketplaces that are at the heart of President Barack Obama’s healthcare overhaul struggled to handle the wave of new consumers Tuesday, the first day of a six-month open enrollment period.
A combination of high demand and technical glitches seemed to overwhelm the online system early in the day. Federal and state officials were working to address the problems, which led to long waits on government websites and a federal call center.
Speaking Tuesday from the Rose Garden, Obama blamed some of the website slowdown on the fact that more than 1 million people visited Healthcare.gov before 7 a.m., adding that demand had initially exceeded anything officials expected.
“Consider that just a couple of weeks ago, Apple rolled out a new mobile operating system and within days they found a glitch, so they fixed it,” Obama said. “I don’t remember anybody suggesting Apple should stop selling iPhones or iPads or threatening to shut down the company if they didn’t.”
People visiting the NY State of Health website after its launch at 8 a.m. Tuesday were greeted with error messages when clicking on links to register as individuals or families.
The links for employers, employees and brokers also experienced periodic problems.
“The website went on the blink twice and I just had to abandon it,” unemployed diabetic Shanti Masterson told CBS 2′s Amy Dardashtian. “After creating an account I logged onto the homepage. I’m clicking ‘get started,’ error page. Let’s try this again. Homepage, get started, error page again.”
Even employees at a help center on Southern Boulevard couldn’t get past the homepage.
“It’s too confusing. It’s not user friendly,” one employee said. “It’s confusing for us as well, so I can imagine what its like for customers.”
Single mother Carmen Colon said she had so many questions, but couldn’t get straight answers.
“Is it gonna cover everything? What about emergency visits? How much is it gonna cost?” Colon said.
Alfredo Piedra is a medical librarian at the Queens Library.
“The seniors and low income people, they have a hard time with computer literacy,” Piedra said.
The Queens Library is one of dozens of spots set up to help people enroll. There are consumer health sections and employees are trained to take customers through the process step by step
Piedra said you shouldn’t just purchase based on cost because while premiums may be low, out-of-pocket costs could be high later on. Here are some questions to ask:
How much is a premium? How much is a deductible? What does the plan cover?
Masterson said she is hoping her doctor is in network.
“I’m hoping that by the time I go back home the system will be back again so I can try. I’ll call the number also,’ she said.
A spokesman for the Department of Health blamed the problems on the 2 million visits to the website in the first 90 minutes after its launch. He said the agency’s technicians were working to fix the problem.
Other Top Stories:
These and many more topics coming up on today’s edition of The Chad Hasty Show. Tune in mornings 8:30-11am on News/Talk 790 KFYO, streaming online at kfyo.com, and now on your iPhone and Android device with the radioPup App. All guest interviews can be heard online in our podcast section after the show at kfyo.com.
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