So let me get this straight, Wolf Blitzer put a perfect hypothetical into Ron Paul's lap and Ron stayed right on course. If a young man decides he is healthy enough that he doesn't need health insurance, and something bad happens, sucks to be him. He should have the freedom to screw up.
Now if only there were an example in the US we could refer to...
In fact there is a very clear example from recent events.
Firefighters watch as home burns to the ground
Imagine your home catches fire but the local fire department won't respond, then watches it burn. That's exactly what happened to a local family tonight.
A local neighborhood is furious after firefighters watched as an Obion County, Tennessee, home burned to the ground.
The homeowner, Gene Cranick, said he offered to pay whatever it would take for firefighters to put out the flames, but was told it was too late. They wouldn't do anything to stop his house from burning.
Each year, Obion County residents must pay $75 if they want fire protection from the city of South Fulton. But the Cranicks did not pay.
The Cranicks' played this one perfectly. By not paying, but assuming the Fire Department would bail them out, they privatized their own gain (a measly $75!) but tried to socialize the risk of the Fire Department (a.k.a. everyone else, who did pay) having to pay for putting out the fire if they lost their risky bet. Their claims to "Pay for what it cost" should be quickly rejected - what if a Firefighter were to lose his life fighting the fire? Would they cover the lifetime of benefits for the family of the dead firefighter?
Unfortunately for the Cranicks', this was in Rand Paul's world, and the Fire Department called their bluff. But there was massive blowback. In the case of a fire with people standing by the side of the road, this can happen. But no hospital would look at a dying young man critically wounded in a car accident and say "He didn't pay his $75, sucks to be him". The injured party would be taken care of - they might get some form of reduced care but we just don't let people die. And the young man would just declare bankruptcy or hold fundraisers but one way or the other - everyone else would be holding the bag.
Risks like these should be socialized - even in a "Capitalist" society. That's why we have cops, firefighters, a military. In some sense it extends to things like schools and roads - all the basic things we understand should be basic needs that are best served collectively. Health care - because of how we choose to react in situations like this (emergency rooms).
Certainly we've seen this in action recently when the banks privatized gain and socialized all the risk with the bailouts. In the case of things like Health Care, the people at the top like the Kochs know that anything where the risk is socialized, that they will bear most of the cost because in order for things like police or fire to be properly funded, we have to have higher tax rates on people with more money. The problem for them is that they are a tiny minority - so how do you get the politicos they want into office?
By preying on the fact that some people are so short sighted that they will gamble their entire life for $75 per year.