To the editor:

The U.S. Constitution, which is less than 40 pages long, explicitly states what the powers of the federal government are. I found no place where the federal government has the power or obligation to provide health care to its citizens.

Worse than that is that the bills are really not about providing health care less expensively, more efficiently or more fairly. They are more about how to regulate the care you get and how to tax or punish those who don’t follow the guidelines. This is the same government that brought you the U.S. Post Office.

Until last night I was waiting with bated breath for some light at the end of the tunnel when Senator Harry Reid announced his plan. At long last, I mistakenly thought, we might have a plan that is substantially less costly and a whole lot shorter. I was very disappointed to learn that it costs nearly as much as H.R. 3962. Furthermore his plan is more than 2,000 pages long, not much shorter than H.R. 3962.

I’ve not read it, and I’m not going to. I don’t think that even with 72 hours for the public and our illustrious representatives in Congress to read it that they will have time to do so.

So where are we? We have clearly not progressed very far at all. This elected Congress has set in their minds that they are going to socialize our medicine, our schools, our energy and our economy. It is up to the people of this once-great nation to make sure that it remains a great nation.

Rationing? Yes, you may have heard that we are moving in that direction already, even without any health bill becoming law, that mammograms and even self-checks for women are being disparaged and that PSA tests for men over 40 are in the same boat.

How many people will have to die before the government stops this nonsense?