ObamaCare isn’t one:
The technocratic idea is that you put a bunch of smart, competent people in government — folks who really want the thing to work — and they’ll make it happen. But “smart, competent people” are not a generic quantity; they’re incredibly domain-specific. Most academics couldn’t run a lemonade stand. Most successful entrepreneurs wouldn’t be able to muster the monomaniacal devotion needed to get a Ph.D. Neither group produces many folks who can consistently generate readable, engaging writing on a deadline. And none of us would be able to win a campaign for Congress.
Yet in my experience, the majority of people in these domains think that they could do everyone else’s job better, if they weren’t so busy with whatever it is they’re doing so well. It’s the illusion of omnicompetence, and in the case of HealthCare.gov, it seems to have been nearly fatal.
Remember, Obama was a better speech writer than his speech writers, knew policy better than his policy advisors, would make a better chief of staff than his chief of staff. He is the Dunning-Kruger effect personified.
Obama’s failings are so stark and his difficulties with reality so glaring that I’m confident that by the time DSM VI or VII rolls out, he’ll have a cluster of profound psychological issues named after him. When one of his aides inform him that he’s made it into the psychology books with something called “Obama Perceptual Disorder Syndrome”, he’ll assume that it describes someone whose mind can cut through complex issues to see the Truth were others could not, and take it as a huge compliment.
There’s another couple weirdnesses that feed into this as well.
On abortion “That’s above my pay grade”. That is, -thinking- about tough issues isn’t his job. He’s said this with less-pithy quotes about a ream of issues, with his stock response of “letting the experts do the research.”
And on the other hand, you have the clear disengagement. His singular keystone achievement, and he hasn’t read -any- of the reports, or been at -any- of the key meetings in three years.
So: Let other people do the thinking, then overrule them because you’re smarter, and then accept none of the personal responsibility. Yes, there’s the “Woops, our bad.” sort of responses. But they’re simultaneously of the sort ‘We’re sorry you’re offended’ and the ‘Well, I sort of have to accept blame, but it’s obvious -I- didn’t do anything wrong at all, mostly because I did absolutely nothing beyond “Make it so Number One!” ‘