Universal Health Care Across the Pond: Conservative Leaders Never Mess With It.

I find it very telling that throughout the industrialized world,  universal health care is considered to be part of the national fabric;  except here in the U.S.A.   Even the most conservative of leaders generally honor and respect the principle of health care for all.  No one would ever consider tampering with it.

For instance,  replacing universal health care was proposed in the British Tory Party's 1979 manifesto.   Nevertheless,  when Margaret Thatcher stood for election that same year,  she declared her unswerving support for maintaining the National Health Service as it was.   Whatever the Iron Lady's personal sentiments may have been,  she was keenly aware of the potential blowback resulting from any attempt to dismantle it.

Likewise,  Germany's  conservative prime minister,  Angela Merkel realizes that any attempt to dismantle her nation's stellar system of health care would be tantamount to political hari-kari.   Even former  Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi of Italy knows what would have happened had he tried to interfere.   His fellow citizens would have kicked his bootie clear across the Adriatic Sea --- causing him to land splat in the center of the Croatian city of Zagreb --- and finding himself in sudden need of a crash course in Serbo-Croatian!

A few years back,  a  U.S. health care expert and  scholar named Donald Light offered an enlightening assessment of Britain's  National Health Service,  declaring it totally in synch with the most hallowed of free market principles.  Its advocates believed that it maximized everyone's ability to exercise individual freedom and responsibility by enabling people to take care of themselves and be productive.*

Hmm!  Individual responsibility!  One of the Republicans' favorite  talking points!  

Any thoughts?

*  Source:  Donald Light;  Universal Health Care:  Lessons from the British Experience;  American Journal of Public Health:  January,  2003,  p.  25-30.  ---->  Well worth the read!   Available free online.