While most Americans (it seems) are consumed with March Madness, some will be focused on something far more important.  For the next three days the Supreme Court will be hearing oral arguments on the lawsuit brought by 26 States and a number of other organizations to have the infamous individual mandate under ObamaCare declared unconstitutional.  Our own Jamie Dupree will be sitting in the Supreme Court chambers to listen to those arguments, and we’ll be hearing from him every day on the show.

First ... and I know I’m largely preaching to the choir here ... the most important thing the American people need to understand about ObamaCare is that it WAS NOT passed to make sure Americans had access to health care.  It was passed to address the number one priority of Democrats --- solidifying power by making more and more people dependent on government.  

Surely you know how much I hate being an “I told you so,” (I really don’t), but this is as good a time as any to remind you of something I’ve been preaching since 1994.   The 1993 election gave the Democrats complete control.  They had the Senate, the House and the White House.  They immediately did what Democrats love to do – move to destroy self-reliance and promote government dependency.  The Clintons proposed a government-run health care scheme we called HillaryCare, and it failed miserably in congress.  Most people may not remember, but under HillaryCare it would have been a crime for you to go outside of the government scheme to receive medical care.  If you reached into your own pocket to pay a physician for medical care outside of the HillaryCare plan both you and the doctor would be subject to fines or some time in jail. 

Just a side-note ---  we had a particularly good time on the program when HillaryCare died on Capitol Hill.  I had purchased a copy of the law from the government printing office so that I could read it for myself and be somewhat informed on the air.  After the bill died its much-deserved death we set up some tables on Peachtree Street in front of 750 WSB.  I sat there with the book in front of me … further down the table we had some shredders.  One-by-one listeners came by to tear a page out of the book and feed it to the shredder.  I saved one page for myself – the very page that contained the regulation prohibiting arranging for or paying for health care outside of HillaryCare.  I shredded that page separately and saved the shredded bits in a Zip-Loc bag.  I have it to this day.

Anyway … back to the “I told you so.”   Freedom-loving Americans were feeling pretty heady after the Republicans took both houses of Congress in 1994.  Some actually thought that liberalism had been vanquished.  I told my listeners then … and kept telling them over the past 18 years … that if the Democrats ever got complete power in Washington again – which they would – they would immediately move to increase government dependency among the voters so that they would never, ever face losing control and power again.

Sure enough --- as soon as Barack Obama stepped down into the Oval Office, the Democrats made their move.  They went for the gold ring --- complete and absolute control over the health care of all Americans.  Their original plan was to establish a “single payer” for your health care needs.  Now there’s an interesting turn of a phrase.   “Single payer” is just a nifty little sugar-coated term for “government paid.”  Surely you don’t think that the Democrats were going to set up ADP payroll services or some other private company to handle the job, do you?  Democrats knew, and most Americans not educated in government schools knew,  that the “single payer” the progs were referring to was the government – and once the government controlled all payments for medical care, it’s over.  Socialized medicine.

All you need to know that the Democrat goal in their so-called “health care reform” efforts was nothing but a move to socialized medicine is to consider the fact that they never considered ONE SINGLE PRIVATE SECTOR OPTION in their deliberations.  They set the health insurance companies up as the villains, and developed a plan to destroy them and replace them with government. 

Ohhhhhhhh!  The evil insurance companies wouldn’t insure pre-existing conditions?  Are you kidding me?  This is supposed to be health INSURANCE!  Not a health care payment plan.  The very essence of insurance is that you’re covered against UNEXPECTED losses and expenses.  Automobile insurance doesn’t pay for oil changes, gas or new tires.  Those are expenses you expect when you own a car.  And you don’t buy auto insurance to repair your car AFTER you’ve had a wreck.  But with health insurance we expect virtually everything to be paid for, and we feel we should be able to buy insurance after we become ill.  If we looked at car insurance the way we look at health insurance it would cost you $6000 a year to insure a clunker .. .and that’s with a perfect driving record. 

And while we’re at it … Health insurance policies should no more cover contraceptives than a homeowner’s insurance policy should cover Draino.  It’s your plumbing.  Keep it clean. 

Back to the private sector options.  There were so many such the Democrats could have considered.  How about getting rid of mandates?  Did you know that in Connecticut all health insurance policies were required by state law to cover hair transplants for balding men?  Transplants are expensive --- I know – and as soon as coverage was mandated the companies had to increase their premiums to cover the costs!  So you had a middle-class family of four somewhere struggling to pay higher health insurance premium because some joker across the state wanted someone else to pay for some hair plugs.  Being bald is not a health problem.  If it were I wouldn’t be the healthy specimen I am today.  There is no reason in hell that insurance should cover costs like this … but there you are.  Did the Democrats suggest reforming this area of health insurance?  Not on your life.  Did the Democrats propose allowing someone in Connecticut to buy their health insurance from a company in Ohio that didn’t include hair transplant coverage?  No way! 

Another simple reform would have been to empower nurse practitioners and physician assistants to diagnose and treat simple wounds and diseases, including writing prescriptions.  Why in the world do you need seven years of education and residency to diagnose the flu and prescribe some drugs?  Or to stitch up a laceration?  It’s simple:  The goal here was not to make medical care less expensive.  The goal was and is to make you dependent on government for your health care; and when we reach that point if the government says “frog,” you jump.  If the government says “jump,” you ask “how high?” 

The ultimate goal?  Easy:  When elections roll around Democrats want to be able to say “If you vote for the Republicans they’ll take away your health care.”  Simple as that.  If you were receiving and paying for your health care through private sector practitioners and insurance companies the Democrats would not have that scare tactic to use.  Eliminate the private sector (the true goal of ObamaCare) and you’re position of power is almost guaranteed. 

The American capitalistic private sector has, over hundreds of years, shown itself to be the most effective delivery mechanism for the necessities of life, as well as the world’s greatest innovator.  Those of you who can remember the explosion in telecommunications technology once the government abandoned the idea of a monopoly over telephone service know just what I’m talking about here.  And just what do you think your cars would look like if the government controlled the auto industry?  Can you say “Chevy Volt?”   If you believe that the Democrats were actually trying to improve the delivery, quality and efficiency of health care with their government takeover, they you are truly beyond redemption. 

But … let’s talk about the case before the Supreme Court.

For the next three days, the Supreme Court will be hearing arguments on ObamaCare … arguments that could potentially shape the nature of our Republic indefinitely.  As George Will so aptly put it, this is “the last exit ramp on the road to unlimited government.”  Caesar Obammus came into power preaching “fundamental transformation.”  Siding with ObamaCare would certainly qualify as such.  We will go from a free people to people who are unwillingly forced by the government into a contract with another private individual simply because you life in this so-called “land of the free.”

This breach of our freedoms won’t go down without a fight.  This is where the tea parties step in.  Over the weekend, tea party supporters held a rally in Washington to protest ObamaCare.  Our own Herman Cain spoke at the rally.  Also Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert warned that ObamaCare "takes a huge leap toward socialism.”  He says, "This is a government takeover masked as a health care bill."  Sadly, for many libs and proggies out there .. they are OK with this notion of government taking over our healthcare.  These are the moochers, the ignorant or those who benefit from the ignorance of the moochers.  Perhaps that is the most depressing part about this ObamaCare debate: Many people don’t even care about the repercussions of this decision.  I assure you that more Americans will be worried about their March Madness brackets this week than the Supreme Court arguments, with the future of freedom in the balance.

To give you an idea of how important this decision is, the Court will hear a nearly unprecedented six hours of arguments over the next few days.  That’s six times the length allotted for most cases.  Usually the court relies pretty much exclusively on written briefs.  There are actually multiple parts to these arguments.  Our own news ferret Jamie Dupree explains what will be heard on the first day of arguments: The question of whether or not the Supreme Court has standing to rule on the constitutionality of the tax penalty associated with the individual mandate at this time.   On Tuesday the focus will be on the infamous insurance mandate.  On Wednesday the Court will consider whether ruling the insurance mandate unconstitutional deems the entire law unconstitutional and whether the federal government can coerce states to expand their Medicaid programs by threatening to cut off federal aid.

Remember that Jamie Dupree will be sitting in on the arguments, so we will get first-hand coverage of this historic event.

Remember also that I’ve had a certain amount of legal training myself.  I’ll be looking at the pleadings, listening to the arguments, and telling you what these Supreme Court Justices should be thinking --- those who still have a loyalty to the Constitution, that is. 

Hang on folks.  It’s going to be a helluva week.