Just when we thought it was too good to be true that Democrats were still touting House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California as the face of their party, they’ve come back with an even greater gift for Republicans – democratic socialist congressional candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, running as a Democrat for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from New York City.

Over the last several weeks we've seen a dramatic increase in discussion of socialism and what it actually means, sparked mostly by the Democrats onboarding of the 28-year-old Ocasio-Cortez after her surprise primary victory that made her a House candidate.

Many conservatives get angry at the sight of Ocasio-Cortez on TV news programs. I welcome her – and the Republican Party should as well. We must appreciate the opportunity to contrast our free-market platform with the socialist ideas of a former bartender who has said she believes that "unemployment is low because everyone has two jobs."

It’s a no-brainer that every Republican should welcome a debate with this disciple of democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, with her many radical positions.

I was a physician in rural Kansas for almost 30 years before I was elected to Congress in 2016. So personally, I believe the most practical way we can crush the rise of democratic socialists is to tear apart their most popular proposal: Medicare for all.

There is no such thing as “Medicare for all.” That phrase in and of itself is a complete and total scam.

Medicare only exists because a free-market health-care system allows it to exist. Medicare can only function within a relatively open market system that still inspires America's best and brightest to become doctors, nurses, and health-care innovators.

If you want to see what “Medicare for all” looks like, look no further than the last 25 years of the Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals. I would encourage socialists like Ocasio-Cortez to ask a veteran dependent on the VA what he or she thinks of their government-run health care – but Ocasio-Cortez won't do that.

It is no secret that despite the strides President Trump and this Congress have made, there is still much work to be done for our vets when it comes to offering them quality health care.

No pundit, politician or health-care professional can deny that due entirely to the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare) and government-mandated electronic medical records, more physicians and nurses are quitting or opting for early retirement than ever before.

What it all comes down to is control versus choice. The Democrats (socialists) fundamentally believe that Washington knows what’s best for you and your family – better than you do. In contrast, the Republican Party still strongly believes that when given choices in the marketplace of products, ideas and health care, the individual knows what’s best for his or her family.

Socialized medicine means agencies would have the power to decide which doctor you take your children to, or what hospital should treat your aging parents and relatives. A vote for these socialist Democrats means rationing health-care services, waiting months to see a primary care physician, and waiting two to three years for joint replacement or a basic heart catheterization.

There will be a government-coded formula for deciding which patients – if any – will be treated for Stage 4 cancer, dialysis or an organ transplant. Socialists and the modern Democratic Party know that as soon as they control your health-care, they control you.

The key to the Democratic (socialist) success is that they need you to be convinced that you need them. Just don't ask them how they're going to pay the $3 trillion per year price tag.

At its core, socialism is a pseudo-religious belief that big-government central planning can take what it wants and give what it wants. It is that very same reason why socialism always ends up dying by the same sword – tyranny.

Once socialism fails, there is nowhere else for the individual to turn. Because of the inevitable failure of socialism, the only people that prosper under its tyranny are the apparatchiks who control the central government. They always live well, while everyone else’s families descend into horrific poverty.

For example, Google "Venezuela" – where some people in what was once a wealthy country eat out of dumpsters. Or research why China and Vietnam abandoned their failed “five-year plans" of government-controlled economies and turned to free enterprise incentives so that they could feed their people.

Countries quickly learned that in the measly five acres their farmers were permitted to grow corps for sale at free-enterprise-based “farmers markets,” they produced more food than 100 acres they farmed for the state.

History is littered with the tattered remains of the socialist dogma of Sen. Bernie Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez and now the Democratic Party’s midterm platform.

Ocasio-Cortez and the socialists in Congress like to fly the banner of open borders and immigration. Well, I don't know a single immigrant in Kansas who dreamed of coming to the United States chasing the beaming light of socialism. I’ll be damned if I turn my country and my grandchildren’s future over to socialism.

Defeating the Democrats and their socialist poster candidates will remain our priority this fall, and we will succeed. In the meantime, Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are welcome back to my home state of Kansas anytime; they spend money in the state and get votes for the Republican Party.