Did Medicare Part D have the same rollout problems as the Obamacare online marketplaces?

Democrats are pleading for patience as they try to reassure the country that the online insurance marketplaces critical to President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul can be fixed.

Big programs have seen rocky rollouts only to achieve success later, they say. Their top example: the 2005 launch of Medicare Part D, President George W. Bush’s prescription drug benefit plan.

“Things went wrong with the Medicare prescription D plan that George Bush rolled out,” Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., told MSNBC on Nov. 6. “When things go wrong, there are two things we can do as a country. We can spend all our time figuring out who to blame, or we can spend all our time figuring out how to fix it.”

Eight years after it went live, Medicare Part D is now widely popular among the seniors who use it.

Were there major problems with the rollout of Medicare Part D? And were they comparable to the challenges facing Obamacare? We decided to take a more a detailed look at its implementation. We rated Israel’s statement True. Read our report for full details.