A letter to my Senator

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   I emailed one of my Senators yesterday. Just thought I'd Share:

Dear Senator Voinovich, 

              My name
is Ryan xxxxxxx. I am a politically interested student and an up incoming voter
who very much values my right to participate in the political process. I email
you today in an attempt to exercise that right. My topic of discussion, or
rather complaint, is the U.S. Federal budget. 

I try to be an informed person
and I like to keep track of what is happening in my community as well as my
country and I have notice some things in the last five years that I find rather
disturbing. I have noticed the rapid degradation of our school systems,
especially in poorer communities in Ohio where our over dependence on property
tax levies send the schools into a vicious cycle of under funding and poor
learning conditions, doubt in the survivability of some of this countryâ€™s most
important programs such as social security and medicare, our continuing over
dependence on foreign and domestic oil, and the fact that our boarders and
communities are not yet secure 4 years after 9/11 among many other things. I
believe a lot of this comes from gross under-funding on the part of the
national government, which is particularly bad in the areas of education,
medicare, and homeland security. 

I know that the federal
government has to make priorities just as the states do when deciding a budget
but I also believe that the federal government has, over the years, gotten itâ€™s
priorities out of check. From the 1940s and 50s up until the late 80s the
United States was engulfed in a cold war with the Soviet Union and found it
necessary to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on defensive and offensive
weaponry, including an enormous nuclear arsenal. Now we are in the midst of a
new millennium, the Soviet Union is long dead, and the threat of nuclear
holocaust is all but forgotten. The problem you ask? The problem is that we are
still spending hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars on a huge archaic
conventional and unconventional military force. 

I whole-heartedly believe that
if we revamped this area of our federal budget that all of the other areas
could be vastly improved upon and eventually become extremely well funded and
beneficial services to our nation and our people. Most people would have the
automatic response that this would leave our great nation open to attack from
enemy armies. I disagree. Look at the facts: the current defense budget is 400
Billion dollars not counting the extra monies put into the war in Iraq. Our
next highest spending potential enemy is Russia and they are only spending 70 billion.
After that is China and they are only spending 50 billion. The supposed â€œaxis
of evilâ€ isnâ€™t even spending 10 billion combined. Not to mention that we have
the best technology, the best warfighters, and the best logistic and tactical
planners in the world, to which our enemies canâ€™t start to match up. As far as
the supposed â€œWar On Terrorâ€ goes, the WOT is being fought on both sides using
guerrilla techniques which have a history of making even the largest most
expensive conventional armies ineffectual. So how would cutting the defense
budget for the overall betterment of our nation make us vulnerable? The fact is
that we wouldnâ€™t be anymore vulnerable then as we are today and would probably
be more secure because we could use some of the funds cut to use at home for
our homeland security.

So, my proposal to you, Senator,
is to put aside any kind of party politics and look at what is really best for
this country. A huge outdated military force that mostly acts just to suck tax
dollars and increase our national debt or a cut down military budget and well
funded, well executed domestic policy and programs that will be used to restore
this nation to the outstanding beacon of domestic tranquility it once was and
even push us beyond for a better brighter future and a country that I, my kids,
and their kids will be able to build our lives upon for years to come. I am
hardly a political genius or an economic expert but as I see it our federal
debt would be best laid out in a manner similar to the one shown below.

I.     
Pentagon (Weapons and Forces): 28%

II.     
Education (Scholarships, Head Start and Classroom
Support): 16%

       III.      Humanitarian
Foreign Aid (Development and Hunger Assistance): 5%

IV.     
International Relations (State Department Activities):
6%

V.     
Human Services (Veterans and Social Services): 7%

VI.     
Science and Energy (Scientific Research and
Development): 6%

     VII.      Community
Development (Local Economic Development): 5%

  VIII.     
Environment (EPA and Natural Resources Management): 5%

IX.     
Health (Research and Children's Health Insurance): 7%

X.     
Administration (Courts and Government Functions): 8%

XI.     
Housing (Housing for the Poor): 6%

     XII.      Transportation
(Highways and Mass Transit): 3%

Thank you for your time and
attention Senator, I hope you take these comments into account as you serve us
in the United States Senate in the years to come. 

                          Sincerely, 

         Ryan Xxxxxxx

    Not that it'll matter cause our government,
especially the republican side, is so disconnected from it's people
right now it's not funny and the fact that it is a kind of raticle idea
but I kind of had to do it for school so I used this topic. And yes, I
did take some inspiration from Ben Cohen. Any thoughts? 