Hours on Healthcare.gov website: five. Hours in live chat attempting to get assistance in navigating the Healthcare.gov website: three. Hours spent taking Barack Obama’s advice and talking to the call center: four and a half, a third of which was spent yesterday after Obama gave out the call center number and assured Americans that they could enroll by phone. Insurance enrollments from all of the above effort: zero.

ABC news reported on Robert Schlora’s journey of futility last night in its national news as a counterpoint to White House claims that all is well (via Daniel Halper at TWS):

The problem isn’t just at Healthcare.gov, either.  New York set up its own state exchange, one of only 16 states and the District of Columbia to do so, which some claim are performing much better than the disastrous federal system.  The state of New York can’t tell the difference, though, as no one has been confirmed to have enrolled through their exchange as of Friday night (via Jim Geraghty):

In New York, one of only 16 states that has its own exchange, not one person had succeeded in using the site to enroll in a plan as of Friday.

Donna Frescatore, director of the New York State of Health marketplace, said Friday that 134,000 people had registered and shopped on the state’s online health care site since its Oct. 1 launch, and thousands signed up to enroll in a plan.

But the state has repeatedly delayed electronically transmitting those users’ data to insurers offering health plans.

The department, which held off in order to verify the accuracy of the information users submitted, said it would transfer the first batch of enrollees’ data — which includes thousands of transactions — as early as Friday night.

In other words, the entire system has big  problems, not just the web portal — and that’s before consumers have to actually start paying the higher premiums and working around the larger deductibles.

Nate Beeler sums up yesterday’s spectacle for the Columbus Dispatch:

It’s a sham … without the wow.