[John Isbell]

Good evening Bill,

As you say and illustrate, with your moving story, the United States healthcare system is far from ideal. I suggest that it is worth comparing with the universal healthcare in place in every other first-world country without exception. Not only is healthcare cheaper in the rest of the developed world; its outcomes are generally better (life expectancy and so forth).
I use this as a key example of the difference between unfettered capitalism and the social democracy common elsewhere. The American public has been taught not to distinguish socialism from communism, and even social democracy is often tarred with the same brush. This I find both unfortunate, immiserating, and in the strict sense Orwellian; the propagandist language is unsupported by fact. For instance, to name one example, communists in the Spanish Civil War were extremely good at distinguishing socialists from themselves, as the socialists' dead bodies testify. Again, Orwell is good on this.
This point applies equally to the communist regime of Ho Chi Minh, or that of Fidel Castro. It may be convenient for an American to call them socialist - and many have done so - but it does Lenin, not to mention Marx, an injustice against which I suspect they would loudly protest.
I will reiterate: Western Europe runs social democracies. Its citizens like that, and health outcomes, for instance, soundly beat those of the U.S. Facts are facts, and worth knowing about, as I'm sure you appreciate.

Cheers,
John