Des Moines Register

 Join campaign for sensible spending

   
By Jessica Maass, Letter to the Editor       
   

I was encouraged to see the Register devoted an entire page May 29 to supporting our three state universities ("Starving Our Universities?"). The articles by our three state university presidents were thought-provoking and timely.

But I was even more excited to see the May 29 letter by David Goodner, a student from Iowa City, in which he suggests, "A simple solution would be to reduce the military...budget and reinvest in social programs like postsecondary education and universal health care."

As a recent graduate from the University of Northern Iowa who made the decision to stay in Iowa, I strongly second Goodner's suggestion. Iowans should know that there is an exciting campaign going on in the state focusing on just this issue.

Iowans for Sensible Priorities (ISP) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan group educating people about how our federal budget is spent. ISP is advocating cutting 15 percent of the Pentagon budget ($60 billion per year) that's going for wasteful, Cold War-era weapons systems and reinvesting it in public education, health care for kids, energy conservation and alternative-fuel development, job training, international humanitarian assistance and deficit reduction.

It's really amazing what we could do with this money. Every Iowan who agrees with these priorities should join the campaign.