For many critics of the Affordable Care Act, the expectation that the health care reform law will "collapse under its own weight" has been a comfort for some time.
Wisconsin Republican Rep. Paul Ryan made a similar prediction this time last year, and others have made it, too. But Rep. Louie Gohmert, Republican of Texas, doesn't buy it, because he believes people will be placed on lists and die before that can happen.
"Some of our friends say, ‘We don’t have to worry about Obamacare, it will fall of its own weight.’ No, it doesn’t,” Gohmert said in an interview with The Blaze this week, flagged by Raw Story.
Gohmert was responding to a question about a report that dozens of veterans died while waiting for treatment at a Phoenix VA hospital after being placed on a "secret list."
“Socialism and communism fall of their own weight because, as Margaret Thatcher said, you run out of other people’s money," Gohmert added. "But socialized medicine never falls of its own weight because you put people on lists and they die waiting to get the treatment and care. So you don’t go broke.”
Gohmert, a vocal critic of the president's health reform law, has made similar criticisms in the past.
Earlier this year he predicted the law would lower life expectancy, and last year he wondered publicly about a debunked conspiracy theory that the law created a “secret security force."
Gohmert said in January that he gave up his own health insurance because of the law.