To the editor:

In Thursday’s Journal-World, a Nobel laureate estimates the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan at $3 trillion when all is said and done. The National Priorities Project has a running total of Iraq war costs (based on Congressional Budget Office estimates) currently at $498 billion. The same site shows the cost of the Iraq war to the citizens of Lawrence as $99 million, our share goes up about $1 per second.

Meanwhile, in Lawrence our public schools need more money, our streets and sidewalks need repair, etc. The National Governors Association meeting last week noted that most states are facing record deficits. Our national debt is skyrocketing; after declining throughout the Clinton administration, it has increased by $3 trillion during the Bush administration.

The president says we can’t afford health insurance for our kids and he wants cuts in programs that provide food for the poor, Medicaid and Medicare, basically everything nonmilitary.

Does anyone else see the connection here? This war, which is supposed to make us safer from terrorists, but a recent National Intelligence Estimate declared has done the opposite, is bankrupting this country and preventing us from taking care of business here at home. President Bush has kept us in Iraq despite overwhelming public opinion that we should get out. John McCain says we’ll be there for 100 years!

We need to stop stuffing money down this rat hole of a war and fund our priorities in America. Who will you vote for?

Doug Burger,

Lawrence