Health Reform: President Obama suggested last summer that the Mayo Clinic was the model for government medical care. On Monday, the Mayo Clinic in Arizona stopped taking Medicare patients. Now what?

If the nonprofit Mayo Clinic is "what works," as the president believes, then it's clear that government health care doesn't. If Washington can't manage a system with fewer than 50 million participants well enough for those who paid for it to get care, then it sure can't run a program that will eventually include every person in the country.

Obama's comment didn't go unnoticed at the Mayo Clinic. While it supports some elements of health reform, the famed practice known for its high-quality care said that under the Democrats' reforms the "real losers will be the citizens of the United States."

Though the Democrats' plans for medical care haven't become law, the losing has already begun for the roughly 3,000 Medicare patients served by the Mayo Clinic in Glendale, Ariz.

They will either have to pay cash for medical services or find other doctors who still accept patients in the government's health care program for the elderly. Those aren't enviable choices.

One, no American who has paid into the Medicare system for his or her entire working life wants to begin paying for health care out of his or her own pocket. It's cruel to force workers to fund a system they can't draw benefits from.

Two, doctors everywhere, not just at the Arizona Mayo Clinic, are dropping Medicare patients because of the government's meager reimbursements. And the pace of doctors opting out of the system will only pick up if $500 billion is slashed from Medicare funding, as is planned in Washington's health care reform, putting even more elderly Americans at risk.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services cautioned that, under the proposed benefit cut, "providers for whom Medicare constitutes a substantive portion of their business could find it difficult to remain profitable and might end their participation in the program (possibly jeopardizing access to care for beneficiaries)."

The Democrats' long-time goal has been to create a government-run health care system in which there are no private options. They say they can arrange such a program so that it will bend the cost curve downward, while still providing health care coverage for all.

Yet the political leadership is failing Americans who have already paid for their coverage. How foolish it is to trust Washington with something as precious as health care.

This is a lesson that should have been learned long before now.