Britain's national health care system is broken.

Duh.

What is truly pitiful, however, is the idea that the bureaucrats think that by tweaking things here and there that they can fix it. This piece in the Telegraph shows why that's akin to The Impossible Dream:

Some of the most common operations - including hip replacements and cataract surgery - will be rationed as part of attempts to save billions of pounds, despite government promises that front-line services would be protected.

Patients' groups have described the measures as "astonishingly brutal".

An investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has uncovered widespread cuts planned across the NHS, many of which have already been agreed by senior health service officials. They include:

* Restrictions on some of the most basic and common operations, including hip and knee replacements, cataract surgery and orthodontic procedures.

* Plans to cut hundreds of thousands of pounds from budgets for the terminally ill, with dying cancer patients to be told to manage their own symptoms if their condition worsens at evenings or weekends.

* The closure of nursing homes for the elderly.

* A reduction in acute hospital beds, including those for the mentally ill, with targets to discourage GPs from sending patients to hospitals and reduce the number of people using accident and emergency departments.

* Tighter rationing of NHS funding for IVF treatment, and for surgery for obesity.

Other changes include thousands of job losses and cost cutting for pediatric and maternity programs as well as care for the elderly.

How about that American cancer patients; do you want a system that tells you to go to hell if you happen to be in unbearable pain on a weekend? And you better not have an accident - you might simply be turned away for lack of beds - and a lack of concern.

We are told by national health care advocates - including our brand new Medicare chief Donald Berwick - that rationing is the wave of the future and there''s nothing that can be done except have government determine who gets what as far as health care is concerned.

The pitilessness of the British model turns my stomach. And the hell of it is, Americans will not wake up to what Obamacare really means until they are personally affected by the changes. By then it will be far too late to step back from the brink and we'll end up like Great Britain; tinkering with a failed system that will only make things worse for everyone.