>the only thing missing from the US to make it European style left wing is socialized health care

And most European countries don't even have socialized health care, just basically the UK.

France does[1], Germany does[2], and so does the whole rest of the EU. So does Russia[3]. Is there any country in Europe that doesn't?

[1] http://france.angloinfo.com/healthcare/health-system/health-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Germany#Public_i... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Russia

I think you may be confusing universal healthcare with socialized medicine, it's a common mistake.

Residents pay tax (insurance) into a common pot, and get universal healthcare. The government pitches in with contributions from the general budget. How is that not socialized healthcare?

Universal healthcare doesn't always work that way though, it's just basically the idea that every citizen is guaranteed some minimum standard of coverage. For example in Japan there's a mandate that all residents are required to have health insurance, but most people have it through their employers. It's not single payer or socialized healthcare. In many countries there's a mix of private and public and a portion of the population is covered by a system like you're talking about, like in the US with Medicare and Medicaid.

It's more about the willingness to say "we represent the poor". The more progressive US politicians will only go as low as to claim they represent the middle class, but no lower. The poor are just temporarily embarrassed millionaires anyway, right?

The closest thing to European style left is Bernie Sanders, but he's such an outlier that he's considered a commie in the US, while in Europe he'd be center-left.