Provisional ballot uncertainty, medical marijuana and voting

Count it out

The writer of a letter Oct. 31 suggested that Kansas voters who are not registered can show up at the polls on Election Day and cast provisional ballots, which “will be considered by county canvassers before the results are certified.” (14A)

I was a longtime supervising judge at a poll in Leawood, and that statement is misleading. Although an unregistered voter can cast a provisional ballot and it may be considered by county canvassers, I know from experience and election training that provisional ballots cast by unregistered voters will not be counted. Unregistered voters should be aware of this before going to the polls Nov. 6 expecting to cast ballots that — although “considered by county canvassers” — will not be counted.

Tom Hutcheson

Olathe

Don’t go to pot

If Missouri voters approve any of the three medical marijuana measures, non-medical marijuana will start slipping in — and will become a flood that will drown Missouri and adjacent states.

The illegal marijuana industry already exists in the shadows. Like a brown recluse spider, it only kills and destroys. Vote no.

William A. Ingram

Kansas City

Help available

Sunday’s story “Shopping for ACA health plan? Don’t expect help” gives the wrong impression. (8A) Workers with the CoverKC Coalition offer free, unbiased help with enrollment.

Despite several changes to the Affordable Care Act, navigators and certified application counselors are still available across the region to help consumers review plan options, see if they qualify for financial help and navigate the application process.

If you need help enrolling, call United Way 2-1-1 or visit coverkc.org to connect with a trained counselor.

Now is the time to become informed and take action. You have only through Dec. 15 to enroll for 2019 coverage through the federal marketplace at healthcare.gov.

The marketplace continues to offer tax credits and other financial assistance to provide lower premiums and out-of-pocket costs to those who qualify. As you shop for a plan, remember: Buyer beware. Some health plans offered outside the marketplace — such as “skinny” short-term, limited-duration plans or association health plans — are not eligible for financial help and don’t offer consumer protections required by marketplace plans. ACA-compliant plans are required to cover pre-existing conditions and offer free preventative screenings.

The CoverKC Coalition includes members from health care organizations throughout the region, the United Way of Greater Kansas City and the Mid-America Regional Council. Funding support comes from the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City and the Reach Healthcare Foundation.

Jim Torres

Samuel U. Rodgers

Health Center

Kansas City

Molly Moffett

Community

Health Council

of Wyandotte County

Kansas City, Kan.

Co-chairs,

CoverKC Coalition

Look to the source

Bill Kristol, founder of the influential conservative magazine The Weekly Standard, is a leading voice of opposition to the Republican Party. Political commentator and author George F. Will, once a staunch, articulate defender of the conservative movement, is urging Republicans to vote against the GOP.

Well-known conservative commentators David Brooks and Max Boot, along with former conservative talk show host Charlie Sykes, all advocate against the party. Says Brooks: “Today you can be a conservative or a Republican, but you can’t be both.” Boot, author of “The Corrosion of Conservatism: Why I Left the Right,” refers to his former party as the “white-nationalist party.” Sykes wrote “How the Right Lost Its Mind.”

Former GOP operatives are also strident critics. Nicolle Wallace, who worked for George W. Bush and John McCain, says the party’s “volume business of misogyny is making moderate Republican women near extinct.” Steve Schmidt, once named GOP Campaign Manager of the Year, renounced his party membership, saying the GOP is “filled with feckless cowards who disgrace and dishonor the legacies of the party’s greatest leaders.”

When Republican stalwarts are abandoning the party, there’s got to be a reason.

Lynn Stephan

Wichita

Intolerable attacks

By now, a few days before the midterm elections, most politically aware American voters probably realize that the daily attacks on President Donald Trump are merely efforts by Democratic candidates and officeholders to regain the power their party lost in recent years.

We have tolerated these attacks because we understand they are simply aspects of Democrats’ all-pervasive lust for power, and because we fully expect this propaganda campaign to be rejected by the voters. We even have tolerated the hypocrisy and political posturing by half the Senate Judiciary Committee during the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings on the grounds that voters are perceptive enough to recognize blatant partisan gamesmanship.

What we should not tolerate, however, is the weakening of the institution of the American presidency that necessarily results from the attacks on everything Trump says and does.

In these perilous times, if the country suffers anything as a result, those Democrats in public office and media spokespersons who are their lackeys will be totally responsible. They will have sown dangerous winds, so they will be held responsible by historians in the future for reaping the whirlwinds, whatever they may be.

Mick Lerner

Leawood

Blessings counted

Amid much animosity, anger and arguing during midterm elections, there still is much goodness in the world, and specifically in Kansas City. What would I do without the friendliness and kindness of:

▪ Willis, the butcher, who greets me saying, “Here comes trouble,” before telling me about his two boys, with a baby on the way.

▪ David, my trash collector, who brings my empty containers to my garage and proudly shows me a picture of his grandson, Braden.

▪ Franklin, my postal carrier, who always has a smile and greets me cheerfully.

▪ My many neighbors who greet me on my morning walk, offer to lift heavy loads for me, offer a car for a day when mine is being repaired and even bandaged my bleeding head wound early one Sunday morning when I showed up at his front door before my trip to the emergency room. (He’s a physician.)

▪ My pastor, Jim, who feeds me spiritually each Sunday at church.

Yes, life is good and so are people in Kansas City

Sara Colt

Mission Hills

Not in the game

I took the time to watch the so-called debate sponsored by The Star, KCPT and Fox 4 Tuesday. It was a painful hour.

Rep. Kevin Yoder was clearly the aggressor, his college debate experience apparent. Sharice Davids’ inexperience and nervousness were also on display.

Yoder opined generally, attacked specifically and dissembled deviously in polished political fashion. He highlighted the opioid crisis as a key national issue, then wildly and acrobatically tried to loop immigration into his attack. He falsely accused Davids for extolling “open borders.” He continued, ominously, “That brings a lot of drugs into our country.”

It was a specious ad hominem, in the vein that current Republican standardbearers seem chained to, but it was still a lie. Opioids have been overprescribed by American doctors in America for decades, encouraged by an out-of-whack American health care system. Refugees seeking asylum at the southern border, alone and in groups, in ebbs and tides for decades, are not adding to that particular crisis.

Yoder also added to our confusion (the Environmental Protection Agency is Enemy No. 1?) and amplified the national crisis of character, empathy and leadership.

The debate underscored why residents of Kansas’ 3rd District are looking to a novice to walk with them into a hopeful, better future.

Leslie D. Mark