Weekly addresses: GOP sticks to health care, Obama pivots to the economy - CNN (blog)

(CNN) – While Republicans continued on the anti-Obamacare offensive, President Barack Obama largely pivoted away from the troubled rollout of Healthcare.gov, instead focusing his address on the economy.

Texas Republican Rep. Michael Burgess, a physician and vice chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, called the Affordable Care Act a "train wreck for doctors, a train wreck for patients, and most importantly, it's a train wreck for the American people."

"It has now become clear that the reality of the president's health care law does not match what he promised: A website that was launched before it was finished. Waves of cancellation letters. The sticker shock of high premiums, coupled with ever-increasing deductibles," Burgess said in the GOP weekly address released Saturday.

Technical glitches barred many Americans from signing up through the federal online healthcare marketplace since the site's October 1 launch. Obama and administration officials have admitted they "fumbled" the rollout of the website and promised significant improvements to its functionality by the end of the month.

In addition to Americans having trouble accessing the site, many have reported losing their plans despite a promise from the administration that if you had an insurance plan you liked, you could keep it under the act.

The President has since announced a legislative fix to the law, allowing some people to remain on their insurance for another year, and Friday extended the sign-up deadline from December 15 to December 23 in order to have coverage at the beginning of next year.

"Over the past couple months, most of the political headlines you've read have probably been about the government shutdown and the launch of the Affordable Care Act," Obama said in his weekly address.

"And I know that many of you have rightly never been more frustrated with Washington. But if you look beyond those headlines, there are some good things happening in our economy. And that's been my top priority since the day I walked into the Oval Office."

Obama continued: "Five years later, we have fought our way back. Our businesses have created 7.8 million new jobs in the past 44 months. Another 200,000 Americans went back to work last month."

Obama touted less dependency on foreign oil, the comeback of the auto industry and his work cutting the nation's deficits.

But the President's address was not without political undertones, jabbing at Republicans for their continued assault on Obamacare and last month's 16-day partial government shutdown.

"Think about what we could do if a reckless few didn't hold the economy hostage every few months, or waste time on dozens of votes to repeal the Affordable Care Act rather than try to help us fix it," he said.