Will Obamacare succeed where term limits failed?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Until someone finally comes along and suggests a proper universal government health care plan, you are correct. But I have a feeling the time is coming when a major politician will campaign for just that, and nothing less.

Unlikely.

In order to understand why the US lacks a 1st World Healthcare system, you first need to understand why the First World Countries have these systems.

The impetus was the overwhelming number of lives ruined by two successive world wars - with so many dead, so many absent fathers, the European States were forced to develop welfare systems to support their wives and children. Likewise, the surviving veterans of these wars constituted the majority of the male adult population, and the majority of them needed a doctor for something. In the UK you also had numerous Civilians who had been wounded in the bombing campaigns.

Everybody needed a doctor, or they needed someone to pay for food - rationing remained in effect in the UK for years.

Those governments that were even functioning immediately after the War were simply forced to pay for the care their populations needed - the impetus was both moral and political - the ousting of the Conservatives in the UK demonstrated that the British people would not support Winston Churchill, despite his heroic stature - they wanted Clement Atlee and the Welfare State.

In the US, you have a tradition of exceptionalism, for groups and individuals. You looked at the returning soldiers, and you decided that Veterans needed support and healthcare, then you decided the very poor did.

Even today - few Americans can conceive of a general need for services. This extends beyond healthcare, it encompasses other services, like law enforcement and provision of other emergency services. In the rest of the Anglo-sphere these services started in large cities, but were then extended to counties and regions by the end of the 19th Century. In the US the majority of Counties still rely on elected politicians to provide Law Enforcement and a Judiciary, rather than professionals appointed by the State.

Bottom line - the US can't bare the weight of the concepts required for universal healthcare provision - if it could the "Public Option" would not have been dropped, and would now be driving the majority of Private Providers out of business.