Letters: Readers discuss Sam Brownback, the Paris climate accord and those winning Royals
Health shopping?
Aaron Hedlund’s vision of a free market for health care is a delusion if not a deception. (July 25, 13A, “Time for a free market reset on health care”)
Markets rely on willing buyers and sellers arranging mutually satisfactory exchanges, with the parties sharing accurate facts. As patients, we have limited knowledge or understanding of what is happening to us medically. Most of us rely on medical professionals or loved ones for advice.
We have even less information about the price of services and are at a disadvantage in understanding and buying health insurance. And even if information and price were clear, many medical episodes are too urgent to allow shopping for the best deal. Patients generally are not hoping to become customers.
The idea that we can fix our ailing health care system by creating a free market is nonsense.
Martyn Howgill
Overland Park
No foresight
When President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from the Paris climate agreement, only about one-third of Americans agreed with him, according to an AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs poll.
Worldwide, only Nicaragua and Syria didn’t sign it, with all other nations recognizing the threat of global warming. At home, 58 percent of Americans believe global warming is mostly caused by human activity, according to the Yale Climate Opinion Maps. Hey, 97 percent of climate scientists know this, but we’ll get there.
In Congress, a bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus has formed. Earlier this month, 22 Republicans from that caucus, along with 24 other Republicans, voted with Democrats to defeat an amendment proposed by a conservative House Freedom Caucus member. It would have killed a Defense Department report on the threats posed by climate change to military installations. The vote was 234-185 to defeat an example of misguided ignorance.
Trump is swimming against the tide of the world, six in 10 Americans, some congressional Republicans and reality. By 2050, Trump will have faded into history, and the height of sea walls around Miami, New Orleans and the Gulf Coast will worry us as a nation far more than the height of a border wall.
Dave Mitchell
Kansas City
For workers
Right to work is pro-worker, not anti-union. If a union is serving its members, it has nothing to fear from this new law. Workers should not be forced to join a union and have money taken from their paychecks if they feel the union is not accountable to its local members.
Unions are trying to mislead Missouri voters about right to work and stop this worker-freedom law from taking effect with a new petition drive. Union bosses don’t like right to work because it requires accountability to local members.
Many union members tell me they’re frustrated that the dues they pay to the union are used to help prop up a candidate or the liberal issue of the day even if they don’t support that candidate or cause. They want their union to be there for them, not doing the bidding of national labor leaders.
Missourians supported right to work when they supported a pro-right-to-work legislature and governor. Missouri’s business climate is already improving thanks to passage of pro-growth initiatives such as right to work. In fact, Missouri jumped nine spots in CNBC’s “Best States for Business” from 2016 to 2017. Now we must defend the policy.
Sen. Ron Richard
President Pro Tem
Missouri Senate
Joplin
Man for the job?
The appointment of Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback as ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom is like Bill Clinton making Jesse Jackson his spiritual leader. (July 27, 1A, “Trump taps Brownback for ambassadorship”)
James Carr
Kansas City, Kan.
It’s real
The race is on. Go Royals!
Jim Walsh
Overland Park
What’s cookin’
Dear President Donald Trump: If you can’t take the heat, get your family out of the kitchen.
Bob Campbell
Lawrence
This story was originally published July 27, 2017 at 8:30 PM with the headline "Letters: Readers discuss Sam Brownback, the Paris climate accord and those winning Royals."