Recently, I’ve been hearing many people clamoring for government-run health care insurance. They want the government to provide everyone with “free” health care. Well, unfortunately, there is no such thing as a free lunch. Someone will pay for this, and it’s not going to be the so-called “rich.” It’s going to come from all of us, including future generations of our children and grandchildren.

Thomas Paine once wrote, “Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one.” The belief that the government should be handling public health care insurance is one of false hope and security. We’re talking about the same government that has provided us with Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, all of which will soon be out of money; the same government that botched the response to Hurricane Katrina; the same government that has authorized $787 billion to save the economy and yet nearly 10 percent of the nation’s work force is unemployed.

If the government can’t get those right, how can it handle one of the most important things in our lives … our health?

It is time to stop believing that the government is the solution to everything. Government is not the answer. Too much government meddling with our lives is the problem. Our representatives must say no to higher taxes, say no to socialism, and say no to government-run health insurance and the “public option.”

Wayne Cotterly, Poland Spring