Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D.

Health care is not a liberal or a conservative issue. Everyone eventually needs health care during their lives. Both sides of the political spectrum have been blindsided by insurance companies and their need for greed. We are not getting the best medical care, and more and more people are being left behind.

Insurance is a risk-based gambling concept that generates profit from beating the odds. That is not the key to medical care. We need to move from an insurance-based health care system.

Frankly, when you add up the amount of money spent on insurance premiums, deductibles, co-pays, medications not covered by insurance, hospital write-offs for uninsured and the cost of fraud cheating the insurance companies, we could all be covered by a better system through an administered pay-in pool.

We have to be smarter than the problem. We need consensus, not contentiousness. Stop forcing your will and move to work together. Get the insurance, drug and medical-supply lobbyists out of the pockets of our congressmen and senators.

Ladies and gentlemen, clean up your swamp. Work together for the common good.

Patrick W. Emmett

Overland Park

Congratulations to the dedicated professionals of the USSS as they celebrate their 152nd anniversary. Thank you! ➡️https://t.co/mDhFzDm3ED pic.twitter.com/BcB3wLjILg

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 5, 2017

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Here are highlights from Stage 5 of the Tour de France.

Here.

Here.

I Advance Masked (1982).

Here is Ann Coulter's latest column.

CNN is a national laughingstock. CNN distorts everything Donald Trump says and does. Its aim is not to inform or edify; it is to destroy a man it hates. If Donald Trump were to walk on water, CNN would report that Trump can't swim. (Some of you will remember this line from long ago.)

Addendum: I have never known a leftist who has a sense of humor. Leftists are grim, whiny, and hateful. Nothing in life makes them happy. Nothing makes them smile. Nothing makes them laugh.

Whether or not you believe President Trump is involved, you should be concerned about evidence of Russian intervention in our election, not just through false stories but attempts to hack voting systems. It shows that an adversary can attack not only our infrastructure, but our electoral process, as well.

There have been demonstrations of hackers remotely accessing the controls of cars and we have been alerted to the possibility that someone could access any of our electronic devises. And there have been several stories about the possibility of hacking the controls of our power grid, flood control systems, nuclear power plants and oil pipe lines—so we know electronic technology has made important systems vulnerable.

The fact that Russians exploited the vulnerability of our electoral system should be important to everyone. If Russians attempted to access the electronic voting systems in several states, not just political committee computers, then we should know we have seen the first major attack in a new kind of war.

Russian President Putin is a former KGB officer and apparently still sees the west as Russia's mortal enemy. He will try to defeat us however possible. One way would be to effect the outcomes of elections in Europe, undermining their credibility and legitimacy.

As ISIS hopes to change our way of life through fear, Russia is attempting to delegitimize our political institutions through fear by capitalizing on our political and social divisions. Therefore, this is a time for unity against these efforts.

Bob Harris, Albany

Note from KBJ: Isn't it interesting that it took the defeat of a progressive icon to get American leftists to grasp the evil nature of Russia? For the past 100 years, American leftists have been in love with Russians. Remember how they mocked Ronald Reagan's term "evil empire"? Remember how Barack Obama made fun of Mitt Romney for saying that Russia is the greatest threat to the United States?