If the system accepted any bad password, then I could believe that it's a return code checking bug. But I would also be questioning Microsoft's code review standards quite heavily. A system that accepts only a string full of spaces as a password only makes sense if one of the return codes is "Error: Bad password: all spaces" and it somehow looks like a success code. That is not likely.

Seriously, grasping at straws. What's the new talking point going to be when less than 1% fail to make their first payment?

I know an Obamacare success is a disaster for some people, but the administration set modest and realistic goals and largely met them.

A bunch of the really bad abuses perpetrated by insurance companies are now illegal, and many more people have access to affordable preventative care. Insurance company profit margins are effectively capped if they can't find ways to be exceptionally creative with the accounting. What a disaster.

You're confused. That's the old pre-Obamacare system. With the ACA you can't be dropped just because you get sick. You can't even be denied new coverage because you're already sick. There are other ways to be injured than in your car or on the job too, and most home insurance doesn't cover medical. If you have a $50 copay for a standard visit, then your plan isn't valid under the ACA and you've lost it anyway.

It's seriously amazing how many people want to return to the halcyon days of last year, like medical coverage outside of employer provided plans was a total clusterfuck and the sheer number of uninsured people with previously treatable but now catastrophic medical conditions that they couldn't pay for contributed to a relentless double digit increase in medical costs across the country.

Believe it or not, some parts of the US have reverted to for-pay fire protection. If you don't pay, your house burns down. Tennessee for example. The homeowner was furious that the fire department wouldn't save his home, but that's the gamble you take when you opt out of coverage.

This case doesn't really apply to medical care however, because if you show up in the sick or injured to an ER, doctors ethically have to treat you. They can't just throw you out on the street and let you die, even though that's what would be most "fair" when you opt out of insurance.

I just saw the nice new box on my W2 that shows "employer health insurance" payments. It was about five times what I would have paid out of my own pocket for my health care last year. Had my employer been legally allowed to hand me that money directly and allow me to pay as I go, I'd be several thousand dollars ahead of the game.

Yep, and then you would get cancer, run out of money after two weeks, and die.

If you could guarantee that you'll never get sick or injured, then insurance would be a waste of money. It's all about risk management. Hospital bills are ruinous (fun fact: they're the #1 cause of Bankruptcy in the US) which makes going without insurance risky. Worse, if you got injured and brought into an ER they would still operate on you, and then everybody else would have to share the burden (plus a big chunk of other fees associated with the inefficiency of trying to bill someone without insurance) anyway. So you're just being a selfish jerk really. You're not paying your fair share, but still expect to be treated when you get sick or injured.

If Libertarians were willing to just die on the street properly when they ran out of money after a simple injury, then the system would be cheaper for everybody. But they never follow through on this.

Don't worry, that reactionary care will be a lot more expensive, so he's more likely to hit his deductible and actually use his insurance. Preventative care can so cheap in comparison that it doesn't make nearly enough profit.

The worst part is, they removed the single payer option in order to bring over some Republican votes, and in the end no Republicans voted for it. IMHO, they should have put the single payer option back in there if Republicans weren't going to go for it anyway. What would they do, vote to repeal it a 52nd time?

Yes, but you try getting a proper single payer healthcare system through Congress. Senators are already bought and sold by the healthcare middlemen, there's no political will to fix the problem.

But don't you understand? Obamacare has to be an abject failure or they might not retake the Senate! No matter what is happening in the real world, Obamacare is a failure. A failure. A failure. Shut up, it's a failure! Lalalalala!

The "It doesn't count until they've paid a premium" talking point is pure desperation. They've already bet the farm on Obamacare being a huge flaming wreck, and now they're grasping at straws because it looks like it's more or less following the administration's expectations.

By law you should have all of the necessary forms by the first business day after Jan 31. If your bank/job/retirement manager/etc... is dragging their heels then the IRS can take them to task.

This whole "but they have not PAID yet!!!" talking point has got to die. The Obamacare opponents are grasping at straws now hoping against hope that the majority of Americans are deadbeats.

A lot of it was just people waiting for the last minute to sign up. Massachusetts (where Romney first implemented this plan) saw the same pattern. Never underestimate the power of people to wait to the last minute to do something. Did you know that December 24th is the busiest shopping day of the year?

Yeah. Space is a full blown character. This reeks of intentional backdoor, there's really no other plausible scenario in my mind.

That's not to say the backdoor was necessarily malicious. Maybe the guy in charge of the password login system was always breaking stuff and locking himself out of his box, so he put a bypass in there so he could get in an fix it, but forgot to remove it later. It's at best really sloppy.

They cost so much because the supply is held artificially low and NYC is one of the most profitable places to run a cab in the entire US.