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August 17, 2007
State’s needs sacrificed to war, activists say
The cost of the Iraq war, so far, breaks down to about $4,100 for each West
Virginia taxpayer. That statistic
was in a new report
released Wednesday by a group of local civic and faith organizations.
The American Friends Service Committee, West Virginia Citizen Action Group
and West Virginia Patriots for Peace released the report.
The Rev. Mel Hoover, a Unitarian Universalist pastor who hosted Wednesday’s
news conference, said, “Our government is off track. We are bogged down in a war
we should not be in. The new Congress is finally working to get the country back
on track.”
Rick Wilson, from the American Friends Service Committee, said, “Today is VJ
Day, the 62nd anniversary of the surrender of Japan on the battleship Missouri
that ended the Second World War.
“It’s hard to believe, but the Bush administration’s unnecessary war in Iraq
has actually lasted longer than U.S. involvement in World War II, which
continued from Dec. 7, 1941, to Aug. 15, 1945.”
The National Priorities Project recently estimated the costs of the Iraq war
have exceeded $452 billion.
Wilson said those include only costs already incurred, not future costs such
as caring for wounded war veterans and interest payments on a growing national
debt.
Sam Hickman, who heads the West Virginia chapter of the National Association
of Social Workers, focused on the unmet needs of West Virginians.
“We still have 36,000 kids in West Virginia who are not covered by health
insurance. The pending House [of Representatives’ Children’s Health Insurance
Program] legislation will cover them.
“I hope the veto threat from the Bush administration is a hollow threat.”
Hickman stressed that modest new investments for programs including health
care, education and low-income energy assistance — programs critical to keeping
working families together — cost a fraction of ongoing federal expenditures in
Iraq.
A pamphlet prepared by the American Friends Service Committee noted the money
spent for “One Day of the Iraq War” could provide:
Free school lunches for a year for 1.2 million children
Annual health coverage for 423,529 children
Four-year scholarships for 34,904 college students.
Annual salaries to pay 12,478 elementary school teachers.
Money to build 84 new elementary schools.
Gary Zuckett, director of WV-CAG, said, “President Bush’s budget continues
his long history of damaging cuts to our social programs and infrastructure
while the new Congress is attempting to restore and modestly increase funding
for our needs here at home.”
Congress must fight White House efforts, Zuckett said, to make “permanent the
excessive tax cuts for the already wealthy that took us from a budget surplus
[under the Clinton administration] to the largest deficits in history.”
The full report released Wednesday, “Getting U.S. Back on Track,” is
available at
www.wvcag.org.
To contact staff writer Paul J. Nyden, use e-mail or call 348-5164.
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