"[I]nsurance companies cannot survive Obamacare without the individual mandate. Under the law, they must offer insurance to anyone who needs it — often at an artificially low price at that. The only way they can make a profit is if the government upholds its promise to get millions of young, healthy people to sign up for more expensive insurance than they need. Take away the mandate — i.e., the penalty — and you make that virtually impossible. If the government tells insurance companies they still have to provide insurance to bad risks, it will be like the government telling Apple it has to sell iPhones at a loss. The insurance companies will sue. And as Dan McLaughlin of The Federalist notes, their lawyers will invoke the Obama administration’s arguments before the Supreme Court that the mandate was inseparable from the 'must-issue' requirements under the law."

"The problems with Obamacare go much deeper than a few million lines of faulty code and a sign-up system that swallows enrollee applications in a single electronic gulp.

"The bugs aren't just in the software. They're in the law itself.

"Consumers are finally seeing insurance rates and plans. In many cases, insurance premiums, deductibles and co-pays are rising. Illinois officials said premiums here would be lower than expected. But a Tribune analysis of 22 of the lowest-priced plans showed that those plans required huge annual deductibles of more than $4,000 for an individual — and $8,000 for family coverage.

"Lower premiums also come with a troubling tradeoff: access to a narrower networks of hospitals and doctors. If people aren't careful in choosing coverage, they may be shocked to find they have to pay much more for out-of-network care to go to their preferred doctor or hospital."

"President Barack Obama is using the disastrous crash of his Obamacare website to extract cash and volunteer hours from his supporters. 

"'By now, you’ve probably heard that the website has not worked as smoothly as it was supposed to,' Obama told his supporters in an email sent out late Tuesday. 

"'That’s why I need your help,' he said, in a video pitch that links to an online fundraiser.  ... 

"The video illustrates Obama’s eagerness and ability to convert even the most awkward policy setbacks into high-profile political campaigns that can help his progressive coalition. The money may be used to support Obamacare, but it likely will also be used to help Obama wage his next election campaign — the 2014 midterm election."

"The extremist in Washington is Barack Obama. He's the guy that wants to fundamentally transform our health care system. He's the guy who has done enormous damage to America's standing in the world. To the extent there is an extremist or radical political view in Washington these days, I believe it is the president of the United States."

"It’s not the GOP that President Barack Obama has to worry about in defending his botched health care rollout, it’s fellow Democrats. 

"They voted for the law, sang its praises for three-plus years and still believe in the promise of health care reform. But now they face a conundrum: stay in lock step with Obama and risk their credibility as advocates for the law’s benefits or publicly criticize the administration for its recent problems — especially a failure to more quickly acknowledge, and rectify, the major malfunction of its Internet marketplace. 

"It’s a particularly vexing question for Democrats worried about their party’s chances in the 2014 midterm elections, and, increasingly, they’re opting for the latter strategy. ... 

"While the administration is urging patience, Democrats who will face voters in a little over a year don’t have the luxury of time. They’re having to make decisions now about how to position themselves if the administration continues to struggle with implementing the central piece of a law they supported."

"There’s no actual debt ceiling right now. 

"The fiscal deal passed by Congress on Wednesday evening to re-open the government and get around the $16.4 trillion limit on borrowing doesn’t actually increase the debt limit. It just temporarily suspends enforcement of it. 

"That means Americans have no idea how much debt their government is going to rack up between now and Feb. 7, when the limits are supposed to go back into place and will have to be raised. 

"There is no dollar amount set for how much debt the government can accumulate between now and then. The suspension strategy was employed first earlier this year during previous fiscal battles in Congress."

"Ted Cruz and Mike Lee may not have been able to strike a death blow to ObamaCare today, but they were able to fight a fight that would have been impossible before them. They have now made it less and less possible for Republicans to collaborate with Democrats to fix or stabilize ObamaCare. ... 

"Grassroots upset about this fight should be encouraged. We’d have never gotten this far with the GOP before 2010. Imagine now the possibilities in 2014 if we make examples of a GOP that refused to fight ObamaCare. 

"2014 must now be about advancing, ever advancing, even through the ranks of the GOP to have the fights that must be had."

"Which party is more extreme? 

"A Republican Party divided between 180 mainstream House members and 40 Ted Cruz mini-me's? Or a Democratic Party united to preserve our fossilized, ineffective public sector? 

"A Republican Party advocating a path to fresh, natural, economic growth? Or a Democratic Party offering young voters the outdated economics of conformity, artificially imposed by Washington's elites? 

"A Republican Party being driven to offer change? Or a Democratic Party united against it? 

"Entrepreneurs, start printing tie-died shirts now. They will be hot sellers at the next Democratic Convention. Both sides are in for an interesting ride, but for Democrats, it's going to be an extreme 2016."

"A growing consensus of IT experts, outside and inside the government, have figured out a principal reason why the website for Obamacare’s federally-sponsored insurance exchange is crashing. Healthcare.gov forces you to create an account and enter detailed personal information before you can start shopping. This, in turn, creates a massive traffic bottleneck, as the government verifies your information and decides whether or not you’re eligible for subsidies. HHS bureaucrats knew this would make the website run more slowly. But they were more afraid that letting people see the underlying cost of Obamacare’s insurance plans would scare people away.

"'Healthcare.gov was initially going to include an option to browse before registering,' report Christopher Weaver and Louise Radnofsky in the Wall Street Journal. 'But that tool was delayed, people familiar with the situation said.' Why was it delayed? 'An HHS spokeswoman said the agency wanted to ensure that users were aware of their eligibility for subsidies that could help pay for coverage, before they started seeing the prices of policies.' (Emphasis added.)"

"In another bit of grim news for the long-term prosperity of these United States, hospitals, medical practices, and related businesses are shedding jobs: 8,000 of them since April, more than in any other sector. For the year, there have been more than 41,000 layoffs at health-care firms. As Paul Davidson and Barbara Hansen of USA Today report, those are mostly hospital staffing reductions in response to reduced reimbursement rates for Medicare patients under the sequester and cuts for some providers under the Affordable Care Act. Private insurers, who are starting to experience a burning sensation after having gone to bed with the devil on Obamacare, are reducing payments, too."