STELLA PAUL:U.S Landed Man on Moon, Can’t Launch Website
http://www.leebsmarketforecast.com/
If you’ve been busy trying to log on to the ObamaCare website, or stumbling around in search of the cupcake shop to which the New York health care website mistakenly directs you, let me catch you up with the latest news.
We’ll start with the embarrassment of a country that once launched a man to the moon, but now can’t even launch a website. Even those who hated the ObamaCare concept, and I freely admit I was never a fan, would have admired a silky-smooth execution that showcased the genius of American know-how. But that’s not what we got.
Now, not only must we suffer through the chaotic disruption of our entire medical system, but the launch also besmirched the stellar reputation of American technology. Oops! Make that Canadian technology.
Canadian? It turns out the perpetrator of the website fiasco is CGI Federal, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Montreal-based CGI Group. To execute its signature achievement, the Obama administration selected CGI, also known as “Conseillers en Gestion et Informatique,” for a hugely lucrative no-bid contract. Even if the site worked well, it would have been nice to give an American-owned company the job, especially with so many Americans still unemployed.
So far, CGI has garnered $687 million in American taxpayer funds, although its track record hardly inspires confidence. In September 2012, the Ontario government fired CGI and refused to pay them, after CGI for three years missed deadlines on its $46.2 million contract to build a registry of diabetes patients.
Maybe Ontario shouldn’t have hired CGI in the first place. By then CGI had already subjected Canada to a $2.7 billion gun registry scandal. Hired by the Liberal government to set up a national database of gun owners, CGI spectacularly misfired. In 2007, Canada paid CGI $10 million to terminate the contract. CGI never built the website, which prompted an investigation into corruption by Canadian Auditor General Sheila Fraser.
So how did scandal-plagued CGI wind up with the federal contract for the ObamaCare website, and for the health exchange websites of Colorado, Vermont, Hawaii, and Massachusetts?
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