It appears responders are more interested in the proportion of the state's population than in the cost of the war to all of us at all levels of living and governance. Shall we try assessing then the proportion of services the entire population needs and receives with that money?
Obviously I should have said the Twin Cities Metro and throw in Duluth, Rochester, St. Cloud and Mankato. Now do I have two-thirds?? My God, where are your heads?? Where are your hearts..and consciences? These are the issues: Taxpayers in Minnesota will pay $1.493 billion for a potential invasion of Iraq. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided: 28,216 Elementary School Teachers or 6,636 Fire Trucks or 222,603 Head Start Places for Children or 459,612 Children Receiving Health Care Those services are delivered primarily by the largest school districts (TC Metro), all of the cities - including Minneapolis and St. Paul (Fire Trucks); Almost all of the children needing Head Start are in the major cities; and ALL of the counties are responsible for the delivery of health care. This was not intended an exercise in demography. This was to demonstrate that those believing that the war in Iraq is not the business of local governments - state, county, municipal - are either sadly mistaken or deliberately deceptive to avoid the hard news and hard choices. Shall we? All together now: $1.5 BILLION dollars diverted from Minnesotans and our already strained budgets, since most of you don't seem to respond to human needs. Budgets. Money. Money. Budgets. Your tax dollars are being diverted not to kill or remove Saddam Hussein alone. All of that money will be spent on annihilating millions of Iraqi innocents, millions of children and their parents who struggle under the Iraqi dictator, but will die at the hands of the American madmen in Washington spinning that it's Saddam we are exterminating, not the people we claim he has all but enslaved. We may never even get to Saddam. But in trying, we'll kill millions of the very people we say we're "liberating." And it will cost Minnesotans $1.5 billion to destroy the mothers and their babies. Put thine head in the sand if you insist, but the reality will burrow down through and into your consciousness and may God have mercy on what happens there. Andy Driscoll Saint Paul -------- What does it matter to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy? � Mahatma Ghandi To find out more or to take the challenge yourself, go to the following web site: <http://database.nationalpriorities.org/cgi-bin/WebObjects/NPP.woa/wa/tradeo ff> ---------- TEMPORARY REMINDER: 1. Send all posts in plain-text format. 2. Cut as much of the post you're responding to as possible. ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
