Weak-Kneed on the Health Care Mandate If the website malfunctions in October and November were infuriating to supporters of health care reform, the continuing parade of delays that followed it have simply been depressing. They have contributed to the impression that the Obama administration is desperately trying to keep the new system from spinning out of control, countering the good news that 1.2 million people have signed up for insurance through the federal and state exchanges. The enrollment numbers have been rising every day in anticipation of the deadline for obtaining coverage, which was supposed to be at a minute before midnight tonight. But, as the Washington Post reported today, the deadline was postponed for 24 hours. The administration was worried the website would be overwhelmed by a last-minute surge in enrollments - hardly a sign of confidence. The delay comes a few days after a far more troubling announcement last week, when the administration said that people whose insurance was cancelled would not have to sign up for coverage and would not be subject to the individual mandate penalty next year. That exemption could apply to as many as a half million people who lost their policies but not have not yet signed up for a new one on the exchanges. There have been many other delays and postponements due to the inept rollout of the health law, but last week's was the first to begin chipping away at the individual mandate, the heart of the whole system. The penalty aspect of the mandate for those who refused to get insurance - the subject of last year's Supreme Court debate - was not terribly onerous, at least for the first few years, but was designed to be a psychological shove towards coverage. Insurers built their policies around the idea that most people would rather pay an insurance premium than a penalty. But now a large group of people won't have to pay it in 2014. They can sign up for cheap catastrophic coverage if they choose, but they can also go without it. Insurance companies quickly protested that the move would mess up their pricing calculations and roil the marketplace. That's probably an exaggeration; what's worse is that the announcement undermines the administration's previously impermeable defense of the mandate. The White House essentially gave in to the Republican position that these cancellations were the horrific outcome of the health law's meddling with the laws of nature. In fact, most people will be able to find better policies on the exchanges, though some in the middle class and up will have to pay more. There was no good reason to exempt them from the mandate, beyond the fact that the administration didn't want to endure any more heart-rending sympathy from Republicans and a few Democrats for those who were cancelled. Where were they when policies used to be cancelled by the truckload in the pre-reform days? Having cracked once on this subject, the White House will be pushed to do so more forcefully by the law's critics when the policies take effect next month. This should be the last concession.