Next to our homes and possibly our cars, healthcare is probably the biggest expense for most of us. Whether you are paying hundreds of dollars a month for healthcare insurance or not, you still are paying for doctor and hospital visits, prescriptions, medical devices, etc. For many people, they spend more on healthcare than they do for their cars and possibly their homes, depending on how long they have lived in them or if you have paid your mortgage off.

Barack Obama and congressional Democrats forced us into America’s first national socialist healthcare program. The majority of Americans objected to the Affordable Care Act before it was passed and now the majority want to keep some form of national healthcare.

Obamacare was sold to us with the promise that it would reduce or control the cost of healthcare, but that was a lie from the very beginning. The authors of the Affordable Care Act knew from the beginning that their gargantuan bill would do nothing to control the cost of healthcare insurance. The sole purpose of Obamacare was to impose 20 hidden taxes and get the American people hooked on a socialist program, making Democrats one step closer to converting America to a socialist nation.

From the onset of Obamacare, Republicans have promised to repeal it. While Obama was illegally occupying the White House, House Republicans passed a number of bills that would repeal Obamacare, but none of those bills ever made it to the Senate floor for a vote. If they had, they would have been vetoed by Obama.

When Mitt Romney ran against Obama in 2012, he and fellow Republicans promised to replace Obamacare with a better plan. Romney lost and Republicans dropped the issue and never even bothered to pick up a pen and start writing a replacement.

Four years later, Republicans made the same promise to repeal and replace Obamacare, but they evidently never thought they would win or be held to their promise so they again didn’t bother to pick up a pen and start drafting a replacement.

When Trump surprisingly defeated Hillary Clinton, Republicans were like school kids who waited until the day before a term paper was due to start writing their replacement. Like term papers written in haste at the last minute, what Republicans came up with fell far short of what was expected.

The House managed, on a few tries, to pass a replacement bill but it was doomed before ever reaching the Senate. Senate Republicans have made at least four attempts to pass a replacement for Obamacare, but have failed on each attempt. Twice they tried to just repeal key portions of Obamacare and those efforts also failed.

In the meantime, thanks to Obamacare, monthly premiums for millions of Americans continue to skyrocket. Hundreds of thousands of other have seen their policies dropped or cancelled, mainly due to the insurance companies claiming they have been losing too much money on them. Over half of the healthcare CO-OPs created by Obamacare have also failed and shut down.

Many insurance companies are again increasing premiums by double digits for 2018, forcing many Americans to make a choice between paying for healthcare, paying the mortgage or eating.

Some Senators are trying to work across the aisle on partisan plans to either fix or replace Obamacare, but so far, nothing has successfully developed.

So, what is the current future of healthcare looking like?

Dismal at best.

Obamacare is rapidly pricing itself out of existence. If nothing is done, there is a great chance that Obamacare will completely collapse before the next presidential election in 2020.

The problem is being able to afford an acceptable replacement.

Bernie Sanders’ Medicare For All plan would certainly require a huge increase in many federal taxes, which is the same problem with any other healthcare plan that seems acceptable to everyone. In order to provide the coverage everyone wants, and many are demanding, would cost at least $1 trillion a year. The federal budget doesn’t have that kind of money and the American people may rebel if their taxes are doubled to pay for it. Recent polls indicate that many Americans do not want to pay higher taxes for a national healthcare plan.

This leaves Republicans in a dangerous paradox. If they do nothing, Obamacare will collapse and they will get blamed. If they pass anything acceptable, it will require a huge increase in taxes and Republicans will be blamed.

Therefore, the future for healthcare is not only dismal, it’s dark and worrisome and either way, the American people are going to have to pay the bill, like or not.