Letter to the editor: Roberts’ priority

To the editor:

Last month Sen. Pat Roberts visited Ottawa to address the Rotary Club in our fine town. He addressed not only the attendees but also the crowd gathered outside to urge him to fight for quality, equitable health care/insurance for all Americans. His major theme for the day was crop insurance.

How critical it was for the residents of Kansas and how committed he was to continuing to fight for this program. After his speech to the Rotary Club he offered to take questions from the audience, and when asked about the Affordable Care Act and Sen. Marco Rubio’s amendment that crippled subsidies for insurance companies that participated in the plan, Roberts ruminated that he never dreamed that he would be part of a government that would be subsidizing health insurance companies. Now, I was taken aback by that response, finding it contradictory considering his stance on crop insurance and, therefore, did not follow up. I’m taking this opportunity to ask now what I did not ask then. My question to Sen. Roberts is, “Why would you be so fervent in your defense of subsidies for crop insurers and farmers but lukewarm in your stance on subsidies for health insurance for all citizens?” You know, real people. Surely American citizens/real people deserve at least equal consideration to crops?