> I was afraid someone would mention preprocessing out the asserts :)
Problem is, you need to understand what you're using, and like it or not, assert is defined as a macro by the C standard. And, assert is conditionally defined (and it's not the only conditionally defined macro).
I know its long, verbose, and dry; but if you want to understand C (or C++ for that matter), you really need to read the ISO standards that correspond to the implantation.
That also has its advantages, but would argue that it is impossible to selectively opt in or out.
Honestly, for a well tested piece of code, the point is moot, since the assert(s) will never evaluate false anyway.