Apologies and Apoplexies

So yesterday, President Obama spent about an hour at a press conference apologizing and taking reponsibility for the healthcare.gov website problems.  He also offered states the ability to keep health insurance plans that don't meet ACA minimums on the books for another year.  Again, this is a customer service 101 response here:  "It's not my fault, but as president, it is my problem to fix."

Response from the Village was of course, calm and rational.

President Obama is now threatened by a similar toxic mix. The disastrous rollout of his health care law not only threatens the rest of his agenda but also raises questions about his competence in the same way that the Bush administration’s botched response to Hurricane Katrina undermined any semblance of Republican efficiency. 

Pundits were equally rational.

As the health law teeters, the stakes are so great because the struggle encapsulates each party’s core argument. It embodies the Democratic belief that society works better when risk is shared—between young and old, healthy and sick—and government intervenes in private markets to try to expand both security and opportunity. The fury of the Republican resistance reflects the party’s insistence that markets work best unfettered, that centralized government programs cannot achieve their goals, and that Democrats are unduly burdening the “makers” to support (and politically mobilize) the “takers.”

If most Americans conclude Republicans are right about the health care law, that judgment would inevitably deepen doubts about other government initiatives. In this world, Democrats could still hold the White House in 2016 around cultural affinity, but they would likely struggle to achieve much if they do. If the president can’t extinguish the flames surrounding Obamacare, this runway explosion could reverberate for years.

And columnists?  Totally, completely rational.

We are two Democrats, one of us a baby boomer and the other a millennial. Not only are we of different ages, but we also have vastly different perspectives. Despite this, we hold similar core values. For different reasons, we feel that the Democratic Party has left us. What we are concerned with here is addressing challenges to our core values as a society and redefining what being a Democrat means in today’s circumstances.

To recap, Katrina, explosion, end of the Democratic party, worst hit for government as a solution in the history of government, yadda yadda.

Bush?  We don't recall.  Things were pretty good then, you know.   Iraq?  Afghanistan?  Medicare Part D?  Alberto Gonzales?  Trillions in damage to the global economy?  All those clearly pale in comparison to a web site not working, you know.