Time For A Change?

When is a change necessary? How do you go about making such a decision and when you do, are you taking time to review your decision to insure you are not acting too hastily? Certainly the President must be going through that now with his HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. The information coming out about the condition of the code and supporting software driving the new Health Care initiative is more than a little embarrassing , it suggests any kind of reasonable oversight on the part of the Secretaries office or staff. Building on top of a 10 year old software platform with a lot of unnecessary “junk code” clearly indicates an improper testing period, if there was any testing at all.

Sad as it may be, the Secretaries reluctance to appear before a congressional committee to answer questions just gives the appearance of guilt and frankly, Ms Sebelius needs to be reminded that she is employed by the people of the United States and there is no option to appear.

People in such a lofty position certainly cannot honestly be expected to have every detail on the issues, but any good manager knows to have regular meetings, get appropriate updates, INSIST on hearing all the news, not just the good news, so they can give their boss an honest and accurate update on where the project stands. Certainly she has had plenty of time, particularly since the first requests came as early as August 15th, yet she continued to put these meetings and updates off. In as much as it was Republican Paul Ryan (former VP hopeful) you and she would certainly have suspicions as to the motives of such meetings, but she could certainly provide that committee with written updates and answer any written questions. Unfortunately she choose to stay silent on the topic and now the proverbial S*** has hit the fan and there’s no turning back.

And sadly, the problems continue to compound. Watchdog organizations report a number of scams now occurring to fleece people out of their money, their personal information, and whatever can be gained. In this day and time you would certainly think there would be some forward thinking folks on the hill that would have anticipated this and put the notice out well in advance.

Don’t get me wrong. In the long run it will be an excellent program and like anything new, it’s going to take a while to get the bugs out, but like most social programs, in the long run it will be far more beneficial but the kind of professional incompetence we are seeing out of the Secretaries office only creates more difficulties for the American people and causes a lot more stress and unhappiness than it should.

Is it any wonder that the majority of Americans don’t trust their government as well as give low ratings to the Congress? The worst of news is far more palatable when it comes up front, unvarnished, straight & to the point than if you delay and hope it all goes away. No forest fire ever went away by being ignored and no criminal was ever stopped by simply ignoring them.

Mr. President, it’s time for a shake up and a replacement. The American people want and expect a person they can trust & rely upon, no matter if they like them or not.