And take federal and state subsidized public transit instead.

And though this goes completely against most of my political beliefs (eg: increasing government involvement, taxes), in this instance I think I agree.

"Forcing" people to pay an extra amount every month, one that is not already being paid via deductions from people's paychecks (on a percentage basis, so it rises and falls with income - taxes), is going to cause hardship. And you can throw out all the arguments about responsibility and keeping up with bills that you want, but many Americans have difficulty with this, and will have difficulty with this. If we're creating something universal, let's just let it be through taxes and just plain old COVERED.

And exactly how are they going to enforce this bill on the homeless? Sure, they'll qualify for free coverage, but with no address, how will they stay active in the system?

That's a fair question......I suppose it's because we don't see government reigning itself in....so when it is moving in the direction of totalitarianism we get a little nervous.

Are we wrong? Did we or did we not lose liberties today? Were our rights to our property expanded or contracted today? At what point would you say government has gone too far?

Only because they have forced the private transit companies out of business.

So is health care. If I have swine flu, and I can't afford antibiotics or a visit to the doctor to get the prescription, and I'm sitting around hoping that my body will just heal itself, then in the meantime, I'm SPREADING swine flu to all and sundry who have the misfortune to come into contact with me. So let's say I do a Target run to pick up some remedies for my flu symptoms, and as I'm checking out, I set my hands down on the counter. Now, the next person in line behind me happens to be a cancer patient picking up their anti-nausea meds for their chemo treatment (which weakens their immune system).

In this case, would my having had health coverage that allowed me to go immediately to a doctor and get antibiotics, which would have made me less contagious sooner be considered to benefit others?

If my hypothetical is a little too... hypothetical, let's go for a real situation:

If everyone had had health care a few years ago, then perhaps the random stranger with tuberculosis in downtown LA might have gotten treatment for it, and therefore NOT spread TB to people they rode the bus with, which included a friend of mine at USC, who unfortunately CAUGHT it, carried it unknowingly for a few years (spreading it to god knows who) and when diagnosed with it, had to spend half a year on meds. All because she didn't have a car for a few months when she was at USC.

Nonsense, if they're so rich from not paying for car insurance then the presumption is that they can afford to hire a cab.

It'll be a false presumption, but that's how the logic goes.

The private transit companies that didn't exist everywhere and only were affordable because they had free use of publicly subsidized thoroughfares.

It's all entwined.

You could argue that the individual mandate is the same. You are free to decline all the medical treatment you want, but the rest of society is inoculated against a sudden change of heart when you get cancer and decide that maybe you'd really like treatment even if you can't afford it.

I'm not sure see any difference between what you say is a hardship in that first sentence and what is ok in the last sentence.

It's a difficult question and unless the goal is a Libertarian paradise not one where it is easy to draw the line. Is a truly Libertarian Paradise your preference? If so then we've reduced the discussion to the basic philosophical difference which can't be overcome.

Just a nitpick. You put a real person into the story but it was still a complete hypothetical.

At the point when the net benefit is outweighed by the net detriment.

As for questions of liberty - while I value financial liberty to a degree, I do not value it to the degree I value liberties that are independent of money. Rights to everyone's life, freedom, expression et. al. take a back seat to the right to your dollar. Now, I happen to also think that preservation of many of the rights that I do consider essential are aided by preserving the right to private property. But given the choice between instituting something that I think preserves a more crucial right (in this case, the right for everyone to have the opportunity to maintain their health regardless of financial status) vs. preserving some incremental monetary rights, I will almost always choose the former.

It really happened.