During the first 75 years of its formal unification, Germany was hardly a model of democracy. A militaristic empire, its leaders led it into World War I, the consequences of which were Adolf Hitler, the rise of Nazism and a second World War.
Yet somehow, Germany from the beginning was able to accomplish something that “democratic” America seems incapable of: It guaranteed the right to medical care to its citizens, regardless of income or position in society (and still does).
In America, medical care is still considered a “for-profit” commodity, and 45,000 people a year die and millions more are bankrupted as a result.
So-called “Obamacare” is a weak start toward guaranteed health care that the rest of the industrialized world takes for granted, but there are least some benefits in this law — and it may one day lead to a day when medical and dental care are not considered a profit center for a corrupt, bloodsucking industry.
