Constitutionality of government obliging you to make a purchase v. taxing for it

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I think the distinction here is the government requiring you to pay for AND use/own a product whether or not you want it, vs. the government requiring you to help pay for a product for whoever wants the benefit of it.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

The reason for making such a distinction does not reside in theories of individual liberty.  Indeed, many critics of a national healthcare mandate, such as Gov. Romney, will concede that the State governments have the power to mandate the purchase of health insurance, just as most States mandate the purchase of auto insurance, or many local governments require that you maintain the appearance of your property, etc.

Hence the mandate issue is at its root over whether we still have a Federal system of government in which there are certain things that the States can do which the national government cannot.

Romney and others like him do not have a problem with this that comes out of a concern for individual liberty, but then it's highly questionable whether he really objects to a national mandate in principle in the way that many conservatives and libertarians and even some liberals do.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

How would the government require you to actually use your medical insurance? You can always pay out of pocket, if you prefer, under any interpretation of the current law, couldn't you? The government only requires you to be eligible to use insurance - but that would be true even if it financed the national health insurance out of the general budget. 

Insurance is about taking what would be a payment for a service, and turning it into a payment for managing risk.  So, in that sense by owning it, it's used because it's acting as an insurance for potential needs.  The government or another third party paying for a service isn't really insurance in the same sense.
Really, what it comes down to is people have a certain amount of money that they can put toward their health or the health of those they care for, and the mandate requires that this money be put toward a qualified insurance program rather than other arrangements.  Not using an insurance that they have bought would only mean they are giving their money to a corporation that they may not want to support, and would have to come up with the money from elsewhere.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I think the distinction here is the government requiring you to pay for AND use/own a product whether or not you want it, vs. the government requiring you to help pay for a product for whoever wants the benefit of it.

Like national defense? Seems to me we all pay for it at the level 50% +1 vote in Congress and the President decide on whether we "want the benefit of it" or not. Other examples are equally applicable too.

national defense is not a product subscribed to individuals.