Kathleen Sebelius has served the nation mostly with distinction during her time as Health and Human Services secretary.

Until now.

The rollout of the Affordable Care Act on Oct. 1 as been beset with mountains of trouble, relating mostly to the glitches in the website set up to manage the implementation of the act.

http://nbcpolitics.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/10/19/21040394-sebelius-will-be-a-no-show-at-obamacare-hearing?lite

The mess-up has been huge. Is it Sebelius’s fault that her team of computer technicians haven’t been able to handle the huge traffic flow onto the site? No. However, the foul-ups have occurred on her watch. They involve the unveiling of President Obama’s signature legislative accomplishment. It has gone badly … to say the very least.

Now the HHS boss says she won’t take part in congressional hearings set for next month, citing scheduling conflicts.

I believe it’s time for her resign and hand the job over to someone else.

The criticism of the ACA rollout, of course, comes from congressional Republicans. What does anyone really expect? They’ve been critical of the law since its inception, its approval by Congress, its affirmation by the Supreme Court and its place at the center of the debate over whether to fund the government and increase the federal debt ceiling.

The very least one could have hoped would be for the unveiling of the law, which took effect while Congress was tying itself in knots over the budget, to occur smoothly. Yes, many millions of Americans have sought to enroll in some insurance plan. But didn’t HHS officials realize that going in? Didn’t Secretary Sebelius foresee the need to ensure that the system would work effectively?

The system has crashed repeatedly. The Obama administration admits it’s been a rocky start since the Oct. 1 rollout. Well, do you think?

Kathleen Sebelius has been on the job since the beginning of Barack Obama’s presidency. And as her GOP critics have noted, she had time for an appearance on Jon Stewart’s comedy show, but doesn’t have the time to answer questions from Congress.

It’s time for Sebelius to go.