There is a widely held view that Congress has virtually unlimited power to legislate, especially concerning economic matters. Consider, for example, the passage of the controversial Patient Protection & Affordable Care Act two years ago. While Congress' power to regulate the economy is not completely unbounded, it is very far-reaching indeed. However, it was not always so.

The medical system does need reforming -- radical reforming. It's more expensive than it ought to be, and powerful interests prosper at the expense of the rest of us. The status quo has little about it to be admired, and we shouldn't tolerate it.

Thus, the American people should be fed up with Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid for insulting our intelligence with their so-called heath-care reform. It is nothing of the sort. What they call progressive reform is little more than reinforcement of the exploitative system we suffer today.

Whether intentionally or not, Obama and company have misdiagnosed the problem with the current system and therefore have issued a toxic prescription as an alleged cure. They essentially say that the problem is too free a market in medical care and insurance; thus for them the solution is a less-free market -- that is, more government direction of our health-care-related activities.

Yet if the diagnosis is wrong -- which it is -- the prescription will also be wrong.