Let me see if I have this right. All of Nebraska’s representatives and one senator voted against the federal health insurance program for low-income children. The vote was whether to increase funding by

$35 billion over five years. That amounts to $7 billion per year. The increase was to be paid for by a

61-cent-a-pack increase in cigarette taxes.

Are those negative votes OK with Nebraska voters?

The Pentagon is asking for $190 billion for the “war on terror” (translate as Iraq and Afghanistan). $190 billion would fund the $7 billion per year for children’s health for about 27 years (they are providing funding by increased taxes, and asking for it for only five years).

Why is $7 billion too much and $190 billion OK?

The Pentagon request is unfunded. Or is it funded by the debt of this nation to other nations? When will citizens have enough of the casual spending of billions of borrowed dollars?

When will Republicans wake up to the fact that the people they elected are not conservative spenders? When will someone draw a line in the sand and say, “that’s enough” to the waste and uncontrolled spending happening in the federal government? 

When will someone dig deep enough to find out where the billions already allocated for Iraq and Afghanistan have been spent? Has it been tracked or expended wisely?

Just wondering.

Marilynne Bergman, Lincoln

Water figures distorted

The recent headline “Corn costs 1,750 gallons of water a bushel” (LJS, Sept. 21) distorted the facts and gave readers the misconception that irrigated agriculture overuses Nebraska’s water resources.  Let me put agriculture’s water use in context.

Each year, roughly 95 million acre-feet of precipitation falls on Nebraska. Of this, 90 percent is consumed at the land surface through plant growth and evaporation, and the remaining 10 percent becomes surface water flows or groundwater recharge. Of the total water consumed in the state, irrigated agriculture accounts for only 5 percent to 10 percent. 

Nebraska farmers already have made tremendous strides in using water more efficiently. Farmers are using deficit irrigation, changing crop patterns and adopting new irrigation technologies and seed genetics to produce more with less water.

As an example, farmers in the Republican Basin used 7.6 to 12.4 inches of irrigation water on average in 2006 to raise their crops.  This amounts to 7.5 to 30 percent less than the amount that could have been used under regulation.  Farmers are striving to be good stewards of our water resources.   

While irrigators need to be constantly vigilant to make wise use of our water, disparaging the amount of water used by farmers will not resolve the state’s water challenges.  Instead, we need to focus on how to better manage our supply and not forget we all benefit from irrigation in agriculture every time we go to the grocery store or gas pump.  

Jay E. Rempe,

State director/governmental relations, Nebraska Farm Bureau

Keep the fair where it is

Once again the other half of this great state (Lincoln and points east) and its leaders are at it again. It just seems as though they can’t leave the State Fair alone. This time it is University of Nebraska-Lincoln Chancellor Harvey Perlman making the loudest noises.

I for one can’t understand his wanting to build a research center for UNL. All we have had since the middle 1960s is a football school. I thought a school of higher education was to educate our young people, not to be a farm system for pro sports. When football came into the foreground at UNL, academics became a secondary meaning for the school.

Just when the fair is gaining attendance and starting to make some money again, along comes the idea to move the fair. Just how many tax dollars does Perlman think Nebraskans have extra for this folly? Everything is in place at State Fair Park, and the Lancaster Event Center lacks enough buildings to support the fair.

Our chancellor needs to realize that he is not God over this state. Hopefully, the State Fair Board will stand up to this bully and keep the fair at State Fair Park.

Bob Lathen, Grand Island

Who profits from war?

What if war were not profitable?

A news report by Lisa Myers, NBC News, airing in May, revisited in a Sept. 21 broadcast by Jim Lehrer, provokes thought about war in relation to business, profit and greed. The report concerns the supply and choices of body armor for our troops in Iraq.

Javier LaRosa, whose Marine son is heading to Iraq, has launched an effort to raise private funds to purchase body armor called Dragon Skin for current troops. In a nutshell, the military is blocking his efforts in favor of their preferred product called Interceptor, even though Point Blank, its manufacturer, is apparently being sued by some police departments for providing defective body armor.

Bottom line: Dragon Skin appears to be less expensive and perform better in tests, but the military-industrial complex, largely with the help of military insiders, has so far effectively barred it from use. A Col. Gabe Patricio, who has retired and started his own body armor “consulting” business, seems to be calling the shots with the backing of friends in high places in the military. The army’s own Nevin Rupert, engineer, expert, who knew the most about Dragon Skin and gave it favorable reports, was barred from military-conducted Dragon Skin tests and soon after fired.

It was noted that there are not huge amounts of money involved in such things as body armor. However, this little controversy is surely a microcosm of the business practices of the military-industrial complex, where major projects cost billions and trillions. 

It begs the question: Would we be involved in a war right now if a) it were being fought by a representative societal cross-section of American children and b) if it were not profitable for American business?

Perhaps peace activists have gotten it all wrong. What if we passed a constitutional amendment that reads: All and any wars waged by America must have all logistics supplied by a neutral country with no business ties to the United States.

Gene R. Bedient, Lincoln