YOUR VIEWS

Not backed by evidence

“Good idea to weigh impact of pot proposal” (Our Views, July 17) presented a biased assessment of the impact on public safety. While it may be true that cannabis use rates increase amongst drivers, two studies, one in American Journal of Public Health and one in The Journal of Law and Economics, both showed that in states that legalized medical marijuana, the traffic fatality rates dropped between 8 percent and 12 percent after legalization. The reason for this isn’t clear but is felt to possibly be due to the use of marijuana instead of alcohol, which as a stimulant is more dangerous. While active use of marijuana should not be done while driving, the evidence doesn’t back a public safety deficit on the roadways from passage of medical marijuana laws. Your statement that Oklahoma would need to increase police funding and would have societal costs from reckless drivers simply is not backed by the evidence.

Steven Ross, M.D., Oklahoma City

Insurance issues

I’ve seen many letters recently debating Obamacare and the Republican replacement. Many people have said America is the only major country that doesn’t guarantee health care to all people as a right. However, they fail to mention we’re also the No. 1 country in medical research, innovations, cures, Nobel Prizes and survival rate. Fifty years ago, a doctor’s office might have a doctor, nurse and maybe one administration person. Now that same office will have an office staff. Why? Insurance and government-required paperwork.

Most people don’t understand that when insurance pays for your care, you’re not the consumer, the insurance company is. That’s why the only way to reduce costs/prices is to: pay for regular doctor’s visits with cash; allow the use of Health Savings Accounts; allow insurance to be purchased across state lines; purchase insurance individually, not through a company plan; and allow the purchase of catastrophic coverage. If a single male purchases coverage, he can pick the coverage he needs and as his life changes (marriage, children, etc.) he can change his plan. People like to talk about economies of scale, but 50 million policies sold, whether individual or to one group, is still 50 million policies sold. Finally, rights end when they infringe on other people. If that is the case, where does the right to health care end?

Douglas Thompson, Oklahoma City

Demagoguery

The rantings of Virginia Sen. Mark Warner that the “public has finally gotten the true facts about the Trump campaign” because of the unfortunate meeting Donald Trump, Jr. and other campaign officials had with a Russian lawyer are laughable. No doubt Trump Jr. should not have taken the meeting and was either naive or stupid for doing so. This hardly amounts in any sense to “collusion” between the campaign and the Russian government. Hillary Clinton lost because of her arrogance in deciding not to go into the states she thought she had locked up. The revelations that the Russian lawyer never represented her government and was pushing for help in the adoption of Russian children by American parents in derogation of a Kremlin decree, speak volumes.

Warner is a partisan demagogue if there ever was one. Not to mention former vice-presidential candidate Sen. Tim Kaine, who has taken up the same rant that Trump Jr. is guilty of “obstruction of justice and treason” for taking the meeting. Meantime the Senate languishes in a state of repose. So much for the American people, who hunger for an end to the health care debacle, a tax break and full employment.

Ray Tomkins, Oklahoma City

Primary challenge

In his first six months in office, President Trump and voters who elected him have learned “draining the swamp” isn’t just about electing Republicans. Electing the right Republicans is the only way to change Washington’s 60-year, big-government lurch toward a morally secular and economically socialist nation. Six months of Republican dithering on their promise of repealing Obamacare has media heads forecasting Republican punishment in the November 2018 elections. If punishing Republicans means electing Democrats, those talking heads may be misreading the angry electorate now, just as they did in forecasting the election of Hillary Clinton. Rather than punishing Republicans by electing Democrats, November 2018 offers conservatives an opportunity to “primary out” Republicans in Name Only congressmen and senators. This means nominating reliable conservative Republicans to run against Democrats in the 2018 general election.

This president has the most conservative agenda we’ve had in a generation. The current Republican leadership in Washington in six brief months has proven that a president without help from his own party can only do so much. We need Republicans who will keep their promises, stop their obstructionism and send the president the legislation he was elected to sign. November 2018 is conservatives’ next opportunity to drain the swamp to make America great again.

C. Dale German, Bethany