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 country’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 it’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 “axis of evil� isn’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 can’t start to match up. As far as the supposed “War On Terror� 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 wouldn’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?

Indeed, feedback would be good, should you get any.

But well written letter.

bluemunky42 wrote: bah politics. smashing letter though, praps it ...

"Smashing"?  Who are you, Austin Powers?

Bugg wrote:   Blaming it on any one president is ignorant.

Bugg, this may be the smartest thing you have ever posted.

lol - meant as a compliment.  Take it that way.

:)

Clark Kent wrote: Good for you.  1 letter = 100 votes.

I don't know, in my experience 5 letters = 1 crappy reply.

DBibeau855 wrote: Bugg wrote: .Ryan wrote:        As far as Bush he may not be responsible for our national debt but he's responsible for a lot of other stuff, either through action or the lack there of...but I really don't want to get into it. Not to sound mean, but DO go into it. Because first you complain about action, then no action. Tell me what action/no action, and I will hopefully do another good post "destroying" your arguements And Dbib, did you say Bush crashed out market? The only time i will every say a president is responsible for, is Clinton and 9/11. He made it illeagle for the CIA, FBI, and NSA to exchange information and compare notes. But thats something a lot of the army people in the pentagon say about the subject.

Wait, you can't be serious? Clinton is to blame for 9-11? What about Reagan allowing for that terrorist cell to form, and arming them? You cannot blame Clinton for that, nor can you blame Bush.

Bugg wrote: .Ryan wrote: Heh, hey guys, it's ok if you're not liberal, nobodys perfect! What I got from that quote was "Liberals aren't pefect" Now, to stand up for my fellows consvs... let us look at this. 1) Ask any major economist and they will say that we (the US) has been losing money 10 years before Bush jr won office. Let us do the math shall we? Bush sr -- 2 years Clinton -- 8 years Clinton was in office for 80% of the time we have lost money. And yes, you dem's are so focused on getting Bush hated, you ignore that little fact and blame it on Bush. Thing is, Bush didn't put us in deficit. Albeit, he didn't help, but our country has been in debt since the revelution. Blaming it on any one president is ignorant. Point 2) Last I checked, a lot of dem's in the house voted for the $87 billion increase inw ar time spending, plus all the other increases in spending. So blaming it on the right side, is again, ignorant. I appreciate that you want to be politically involved, but don't be very biased. I'm biased yes, but I did admit that Bush isn't the best, and that Bush sr didn't help our defecit either. So please, crunch the numbers before you send in the check.

That kinda came out of , nowhere.

-me