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Last year, there was an online service that was in very high-demand.  It was hyped, but its rollout was very rocky. When it was released to the public, it tended to crash a lot.  It couldn’t handle the number of users it was getting.

People criticized the organization that created it for being unprepared for the number of users, and for designing the system poorly.  It was quite embarrassing, especially since the organization behind it has always been a lightning rod for controversy.

You probably think I’m talking about the Health Care website.  But I’m not. I’m talking about the video game SimCity 4. It’s not the only game that had this kind of problem, though.  Same thing happened with Diablo III in 2012.

The game companies got flak for it, too–gamers hate Electronic Arts about as much as Republicans hate President Obama, but with the additional problem that they aren’t allowed to filibuster EA’s products and demand they come back with new ones.  It’s the equivalent of if Republicans had to pass and endorse all Obama’s pet projects or else leave politics entirely.

But at what point does this sort of thing start to constitute a pattern?  When the U.S. Government and two separate large electronics companies cannot roll out a satisfactory online service, you have to wonder if anyone knows what they are doing as far as building online services.

One argument might be that in all cases, the people making the service thought so many would have to use it–because of the law in the one case, and because of the gaming industry hype machine in the others–that they felt no reason to do a good job on the service in question.

But I don’t buy that for the Health Care case, because it’s one of the major political issues of the time, and even if you are so cynical as to believe the architects don’t care about the people, many of them will find their careers riding on the success or failure of the program.  So they had good reason to make sure the product worked from the get-go.

I don’t have any real explanations for this myself.  I just think it is interesting that wealthy organizations, who ought to have enough resources to understand what they can and can’t make, keep failing at debuting web products like this.

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The Supreme Court Justices. Image via Wikipedia

There are two major theories going around about the Supreme Court decision on Obamacare:

The first theory would mean that all the liberal celebration needs to stop.  The second would mean we have a Chief Justice who made a decision based on what people would think of him.  Neither option is very good, really.  But the most interesting interpretation I’ve heard is P.M. Prescott’s, which essentially states that what Roberts ruled was completely consistent with his pattern up to now.

I plan to do some more in-depth posts on the Supreme Court soon–the stuff I’ve been reading about the Court this past week is quite interesting.

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People are lauding Chief Justice Roberts for his decision.  It seems like he doesn’t like the law, but decided against overturning it because he felt there was not much of an argument for doing so.  Which is what Judges are supposed to do.  Don’t take my word for it, though.  Take this guy’s:

Anyway, it is rather funny that what saved the law was interpreting it as a “tax”.  The Democrats tried to desperately not to call it that, because people hate taxes, but in the end that is what it needed to be to stand.

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Two years ago (it feels like yesterday) when the Health-Care bill passed, I concluded my posting on the topic with “Alea iacta est“. I said this because, at the time, everyone agreed that this was a momentous, historic occasion, with Democrats saying it was a progressive triumph and Republicans pretty much calling it the end of America as we know it. Everyone agreed it was a big deal–indeed, some went even further than that.

But now, the word on the virtual street is that the Supreme Court is going to uncast the die and pack up and go right back across the Rubicon. At the time, people had said there would be a big court case about, but no one on the Democratic side seemed that worried about it, and no one on the Republican side seemed to think it would get struck down. The Judicial Branch: the most forgettable branch of government.

What seems especially funny to me is that it is apparently all on the shoulders of one guy: Justice Anthony Kennedy. It seems to me the Court will otherwise vote along political lines, which really takes the fun out of the whole guessing game, if you ask me.

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Health Care bill from the Left. The Right didn’t stop it, just whined theatrically.

Immigration Bill in Arizona from the Right. The Left didn’t stop it, just whined theatrically.

What’s the common denominator? Both bills increase the government’s power.

Just think about it.

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Back in January, right before Scott Brown’s victory in the Senate race, I wrote:

 “Once a campaign takes on an aura of extreme importance, it changes things. Epic struggles and charismatic people complement each other beautifully…. I speculate that charisma doesn’t just help a person get involved in great events, it almost demands them to.”

I then said:

“All sending Obama to help Coakley does, I think, is demonstrate how important the election is. And that plays right into Brown’s hands.”

I was right, I think. But what I didn’t think of then was that Brown’s election didn’t mean the end for “Obamacare”, it just made it into an ‘Epic Struggle” to get it passed… and guess who the most charismatic guy in that fight was?

I’m not sure if this actually is the reason it passed; but it certainly would fit in with what I’ve said before on this blog about charisma.

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12: 42 A.M: I’ll update this post as things develop, rather than have tons of posts about the subject.

9:08 A.M.: Most people are pretty sure the thing will pass. It’s assumed that the Democrats wouldn’t bother to vote on it if they thought it wouldn’t.

9:17 A.M.: Lots of sites are calling this vote “Historic” or “History Making”, which suggests to me they think it will pass. Bills that don’t pass usually don’t get much mention in the history books.

9:25 A.M: The chairman of the Democratic caucus says they have the votes. I’ve never heard of this guy; usually when they’re counting the votes, they ask the Whip, James Clyburn. It’s fun to blog about politics when you have no idea how it works.

11:52 A.M: Going by headlines, the Democrats either have the votes or “hope they have the votes”. There’s not much difference, except for all the difference in the world. But hey, hoping for change was what Obama promised and sure enough, it happened!

1:41 P.M: According to Huffington Post, it’s practically over.

1:44 P.M: Or maybe not. Their headline doesn’t seem to match their story.

4:41 P.M: It looks like it’s pretty close to a done deal that it’ll pass.

7:58 P.M: For what it’s worth, though, Republicans may have some other plan to stop stuff in the Senate. Or something. I can’t stand to learn any more obscure Parliamentary rules, though.

10:49 P.M: “Alea iacta est.”

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…and health care does, in fact, pass, the obvious question is: does it relate in any way to Obama being the most charismatic guy in Washington? (Okay, maybe that’s only obvious to folks who regularly read this blog.)

Frankly, I don’t think the bill’s fate actually relates to Obama’s charisma that much; most of what he’s doing involves persuading other politicians, who I suspect have developed immunity to charisma because of high exposure to it over the course of their careers.

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I don’t think so. The Democrats are disorganized, and the bill is highly controversial, to say the least. I don’t think they’ll be able to convince enough Congressmen that it’s worth the risk.

What do you think?