Customer Service 101

When things go wrong, people don't care whose fault it is, they just want the damn thing fixed.  President Obama understands this.

President Obama said Thursday that he is "sorry" that some Americans are losing their current health insurance plans as a result of the Affordable Care Act, despite his promise that no one would have to give up a health plan they liked.

"I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he told NBC News in an exclusive interview at the White House.

"We've got to work hard to make sure that they know we hear them and we are going to do everything we can to deal with folks who find themselves in a tough position as a consequence of this."

Meanwhile, here in Kentucky, the Affordable Care Act is working the way it was designed to work.

Jennifer Albrecht lost her job after being given a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis last year – a turn of events that her husband, Hugh, described as feeling like “a building fell on us.” She stretches out her medicine because she cannot afford the refills, suffering worse flare-ups as a result. But last month, after seeking the help of a “kynector” – one of Kentucky’s counselors certified to help people sign up for insurance under the federal health care law – Ms. Albrecht found she qualified for Medicaid. Her coverage will take effect at the beginning of 2014.

“I know that starting Jan. 1 there’s some hope, there’s some relief there,” she said.

Ms. Albrecht, 42, is among the roughly 1,000 people a day who are signing up for coverage through Kentucky’s online insurance marketplace, or exchange, a volume that state officials say has far exceeded their expectations. The success of the exchange, known as Kynect, contrasts sharply with the technical failures of the federally run exchange serving 36 states. Even some state-run exchanges, including those in Maryland and Oregon, have struggled so far.

But to watch the sign-up process last month in Louisville, a city of 600,000, was to get a glimpse of how the rollout of the exchanges was supposed to work from coast to coast. 

Kynect is how the PPACA is supposed to work, without Republican sabotage.  It proves the legislation can work, and it's signing up thousands per week.  Most are getting to take advantage of Medicaid expansion.

But in red states where Republicans have blocked expansion, blocked exchanges, blocked making the plan work, and publicly said "We want our citizens to remain without insurance because we hate the black President" it doesn't work very well.  Imagine that.

And yet in "backwater" Kentucky, the exchange is working beautifully.