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By Steve Mistler smistler@pressherald.com Staff Writer

Gov. Paul LePage used his weekly radio address Saturday to blast President Barack Obama's health care law and described the Internal Revenue Service as the "new Gestapo."

The IRS description was a reference to a provision in the Affordable Care Act that requires most Americans to buy health insurance or pay an annual penalty when filing their tax returns. The provision, known more broadly as the individual mandate, was the subject of a multi-state lawsuit but was recently upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.

LePage said the court decision has "made America less free."

"We the people have been told there is no choice," he said. "You must buy health insurance or pay the new Gestapo -- the IRS."

Maine Democratic Party Chairman Ben Grant, responding to LePage's remarks, said, "We've come to expect a bunch of nonsense from Gov. LePage, but this is a step too far. There appears now to be no limit to the extreme language he will use to misinform, degrade and insult people. Somebody needs to explain to him that he's the governor of a state, and not a talk radio host. I demand a full apology on behalf of all those who suffered at the hands of the real Gestapo."

"There is nothing that degrades politics more than purported leaders who so cavalierly invoke the worst in human history when they can't get their way in legitimate, modern policy disagreements," Grant said.

The debate about the mandate has become a political flash point since the health law was enacted. Republicans maintain that the requirement is an unfair tax. Democrats say the mandate was originally a Republican idea born from the conservative Heritage Foundation, which introduced the measure in 1989 as a counterpoint to calls for a single-payer health care system.

The Gestapo was Nazi Germany's official secret police under Adolf Hitler. It imprisoned and murdered thousands of people without cause.

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LePage attacks health care law, IRS