Why don't Paladins have any unique "Cures"

[Sho86]

A tank that self heals would have to be powerful enough to replace a healer.

Thats funny, I don't recall that happening in previous games that had tank heals (unless your counting going through older content in higher level/gear?).

Paladin really does need a cure though. It's worked perfectly in other tank scenarios I've played, your either using the resource for healing yourself/member on verge of death or better enmity gain, you couldn't reliably do both the entire time as you would drain your resource way to fast. Hell, we should take out bloodbath then right? That does a hell of a lot more healing than the current cure PLD is given from CNJ, and is instant without needing to cast plus reactive to your damage, not taking up any time in your rotation. Heals can very well be put in for Paladin.

[Kitfox]

Thats funny, I don't recall that happening in previous games that had tank heals (unless your counting going through older content in higher level/gear?)

Nice job quoting me without the context. The key word there was "with current (FFXIV) content design", not other games. Tanks are assumed to participate in Raid DPS, you know, do damage. If they're healing, defending and so on, they're not doing DPS, and thus will be a liability for DPS checks. Someone has to make up the missing DPS. So either you drop one healer for another dps class to cover it, or the tank has to also buff up the party damage to make up for it.