Readers share views on Congress, Obamacare, 2016 presidential race

Working Congress

If the president is going to be writing and passing bills on his own, then Congress and the Senate need to reduce their pay by half. Maybe then they could hire more staff members to answer their mail.

The president needs to do his job, and the Democrats and Republicans need to do theirs. I hope they all have heard of the word “resignation” because we all know the words “booted out.”

Chad Murry

Kansas City

Obamacare costs

I want to thank President Barack Obama for pushing through the so-called Affordable Care Act.

I have a retiree policy with my prior employer. My insurance costs went up 52 percent this year over 2014. My costs in 2014 went up about 6 percent over 2013.

Although neither the insurance company nor the employer will admit it, it is obvious I am now paying for Obamacare. It’s just another example of our president’s great leadership.

Paul Moore

Riverside

President in 2016

I’m a lifelong Jackson County Democrat who has voted for only one Republican in my life, and that was Noel Torpey, a Missouri state representative. But I would consider Republican Jeb Bush if he can stay as a moderate in his far-right party.

I certainly like Hillary Clinton, also, but I’m sure the Republican right wing will help carry her baggage all the way to Election Day.

It’s a shame in our country that we are so divided between right and left views. Compromise is a dirty word, and the Koch brothers and other big money control our elected officials.

I’m so sick of politics and watching the lack of action in our nation’s capital. Just listen to Democratic Sen. Harry Reid and Texas Republican Rep. Louie Gohmert, and ask yourself that old Peggy Lee song, “Is That All There Is?”

Big business and money rule this country, and two classes exist, the poor and the rich.

Just as all great countries have found out sooner or later, our day is coming to answer for such abuse.

John Koehler

Raytown

Flawed Obama logic

For all the liberals who still think President Barack Obama is looking out for them, please use logic. Do you really think human beings are causing the planet to warm?

Contrary to some assertions, not all scientists concur, and the ones who do have a financial incentive. It’s about government control and money generated by taxes on energy.

Listen to Obama’s lies about the Keystone XL pipeline. Excuse after excuse.

The latest was waiting on Nebraska’s Supreme Court decision. It’s in, and Obama still plans a veto.

The most serious thing Obama is doing deals with Islamic terrorists. Our military could wipe them out in a few months, but our leader stands by during the slayings of men, women and children.

Whose side is he on? He even releases them from Gitmo to return to the battlefield.

Everything he has done is meant to tear the U.S. down.

Steve Prosser

Overland Park

Secretary of state

Kansas is an example of what out-of-control government can do to the voters in a state. Now, state Sen. Will Kraus is building a campaign war chest to run for secretary of state in Missouri.

At a recent candidate forum in Lee’s Summit, I heard him telling a man that he already has $270,000 for his campaign. Is it any doubt that with his extremist voting record in the Missouri Senate he would go down the same road as Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach?

If Kraus is elected to that important office in Missouri, there is no doubt he would try to deter Missourians from voting just as Kobach has done in our neighboring state. Kraus should not be in the Missouri Senate because of his extremist positions handed down to him from the American Legislative Exchange Council.

Let’s not make the mistake of electing him to an office as important as secretary of state.

All eligible Missouri residents should have the right to vote without jumping through unnecessary hoops.

Gene W. DeVaux

Greenwood

Education funding

There are a few simple solutions to the education funding problem:

▪ Reduce the high salaries of the superintendents to what I make.

▪ Reduce the personal assistants’ high salaries to what I make.

▪ Stop tenure and reward performance.

It will never happen, and whining for funding will continue.

Oscar Mill

Easton, Kan.

Iran’s nuclear threat

Thank you for covering the ongoing U.S. diplomatic negotiations with Iran. Progress has been made in limiting Iran’s nuclear program.

Members of Congress have made statements in favor of the ongoing diplomacy with Iran. Many grassroots lobbyists from 43 states attended the Quaker Lobby Day last month and heard from retired military leaders from the U.S. and Israel.

They said diplomacy was the best way to guard against a nuclear-armed Iran. I hope that our members of Congress will speak out in support of diplomacy with Iran.

Jewell Bolton

Independence

Obama’s priorities

When President Barack Obama took office, he stated that members of the Bush administration would not be prosecuted for violations of the Geneva Conventions and committing crimes against humanity.

The Justice Department last year announced it was joining a lawsuit against the NFL’s Washington Redskins in an effort to strip the club of its trademark protection.

It kind of makes me wonder what the priorities are of this administration.

Brad Lucht

Kansas City

U.S. racial divide

People of one race were kidnapped from their native continent, brought in shackles to the Americas, sold into slavery, treated as commodities, viewed as inhuman, beaten, given no pathway to education, finally freed but still looked upon as inhuman, terrorized by the Klan, murdered for sport, segregated, kept from voting through illegal voting-registration laws, discriminated against in the work force and are still being disrespected by bigots and white racists, and yet they are not supposed to bear resentment toward the white race that has been discriminating against them for 400 years?

Really? Seriously?

Who can blame the Rev. Al Sharpton and others in the black community who actually do have a voice for speaking out?

Many of us thought we had finally turned the racial-divide corner with the election of Barack Obama as president. Unfortunately, many whites were not ready for a black president, and the polarizing wounds of racism deepened.

During one of Obama’s speeches on health care in 2009, South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson disrespectfully yelled out, “You lie!”

Our country’s current racial mood was set in 2008 by the elected leaders of the opposition party and by Fox News. There has been no letup since.

Robert Stuber, M.D.

St. Joseph

Affordable Care Act

Brrrr. It’s really cold. I recently helped plan a memorial service for a dear friend.

My friend died because she was too poor to get medical treatment for a treatable condition. That’s cold.

U.S. Rep. Kevin Yoder’s tweet, “Full repeal of Obamacare must be the goal,” chills me to the bone because I am not hearing of any solutions to our unaffordable health care. Do Yoder and those he represents think they are better than the rest of us?

Or are they just well insulated in affordable health care? Maybe it’s an insulation problem.

Jennifer Chapin

Independence

Recurring history

There was a paperhanger in Germany who came to power. He started aggression against his neighbors and the world said, “Not our problem.”

He killed millions of people for an ideal. Finally, the world said enough, and World War II started.

Will the world ignore radical murderers such as al-Qaida and the Islamic State or will it say enough and put an end to them?

Mike Newlon

Kansas City

This story was originally published February 9, 2015 at 9:00 AM with the headline "Readers share views on Congress, Obamacare, 2016 presidential race."