Also, a point for consideration: you're pretty much required to own car insurance if you want to drive.
The labels seem unnecessary here. You could've said "(there are many people here obviously do not)" - there's plenty of smart people who think this bill is going to be bad for the American federal government and American citizens.
The equivalent would be saying something like, "those internet left-wingers who think everyone should be taxed all the time" -> "internet left-wingers" is unnecessary, as is "internet libertarians". The people who oppose this are just people, not internet people, not labels.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/nov/07/obamas-hidde...
It's also noteworthy that in most states, you can demonstrate an ability to pay for a certain amount of damage in lieu of car insurance.
Seriously, this debate only makes sense in a context where you consider health insurance to be an "optional extra". It's not. Health insurance is as basic as roads and garbage collection, fire departments and a police force. Out of the whole developed world, it's only in America that something as fundamental as health insurance is considered an optional extra.
The rest of us, who can't treat ourselves without external assistance (and also those amongst the doctor who expect that they might at some point get ill enough to require assistance from another human being), the rest of us need health insurance.
As it turns out, doctors are actually human beings, who are able to form relationships and make arrangements with other human beings, whether or not this takes place within the scope of formal public policy or under the aegis of bureaucratic institutions.
I guess looking before you cross the road is also "optional".
Unless you're the kind of person whose plan to get rich is to play the lottery, you need health insurance. At some point, in your life, it is quite likely that you will get very sick, or have a serious accident, or have some sort of mishap that suddenly smacks you with a multi-tens-of-thousands-of-dollars-or-more medical bill. At that point, if you don't either a) have health insurance or b) have lots of money, you're basically fucked.
If you pay the insurance all your life and you never actually get to use it, you should count yourself lucky. Health insurance if the kind of thing you pay every month and fervently hope that you never actually need. But if you do need it, having (good, not the american "we'll drop you if you get too expensive" type) health insurance is quite literally a life-saver.
Finally, if you declare bankruptcy because you can't afford your medical bills (and huge medical bills can happen to anyone), society is paying for your treatment anyway, indirectly. Therefore, it is reasonable to mandate that everyone must have health insurance.
As for health insurance, the claim that it is necessary is absurd. One could make a much more reasonable claim than health care is necessary, but the question of the specific mechanism by which it is paid for is orthogonal to whether it should be considered a necessity in a modern society.
However, health insurance is in no way in the same category as any of the above - insurance is a financial tool, used as a means to achieve a desired end in a high-risk situation. Saying that insurance is absolutely essential is like saying that we can't live without zero-coupon municipal bonds. Sure we can, no matter how important the things they're intended to pay for are.
There are a lot of areas in the US (most I'd venture to say...) where driving is essentially a necessity once someone has a full time job. Its not like we have a great public transport system. So while you can technically opt out of driving, its not really realistic to do so in most places.
My understanding is that you need to be able to cover any damage you cause someone else, not to cover your own car damages.
This doesn't kill the analogy though. If someone goes into the emergency room and can't pay for their service, the taxpayers pay the bill. So, by the analogy, the requirement should be to cover anything that the doctor must do because the cost could fall to the taxpayer.
Part of the argument in defense of the bill is that the mandate will save taxpayer money because the uninsured will now be forced to pay their own way. Yet despite this claim, I don't seen any provision for returning this savings to the taxpayer? Where is this supposed savings going? Either it is mythical or it's just going to be eaten up by the bureaucracy.
And also, if the person cannot afford their emergency room bill, they won't be able to afford the insurance either, and thus will get subsidized insurance. So one way or another, the taxpayer pays.
As for your second point, I'm not sure thats true, but I don't have any statistics off hand. It would be interesting to see some comprehensive statistics about how much tax money goes to paying for these things vs. how much money the person makes (adjusted for whatever you want to adjust for).
And yes, I'm required to get car insurance if I want to drive. Driving is optional. Living is not.
Sorry, I'm not sure I see the difference. At the worst, this is an increase of 2.5% in your taxes unless you do something (buy insurance) to avoid it. They might well call it a fine but in both cases its just paying a percentage of what you make. You might not like this increase, but thats a separate point.
Let me know if I'm missing something though...
Edit: I think they are calling it a fine so that people will avoid it as much as possible in an effort to make sure people purchase health insurance.