Letters to the Editor (Dec. 17)
Pentagon audit welcome, needed
I’m encouraged that a first time-ever audit of the Pentagon is under way. Passage of HR 3079 will encourage its completion. Thank you, Sen. Jerry Moran, for your support.
A budget that balances military and domestic needs is much needed, too. A proposed $70 billion increase in the FY 2018 Pentagon budget would require adding $70 billion in non-military domestic spending to comply with the 2011 Budget Control Act. Concerns about increasing national debt make spending restraint look like a better way forward, especially if big tax cuts for well-off people and corporations become law.
A Pentagon self-study a year ago revealed $125 billion in waste over a 10-year period. With its first audit due in November, why not focus on spending tax money more productively rather than rushing to approve deficit spending? Our country already spends six times more than China, 10 times more than Russia, and builds weapons the Pentagon does not need nor ask for.
The times call for a moral budget that does not drastically increase Pentagon spending at the expense of more national debt and unmet human needs. Health care, education, infrastructure, and Social Security are at risk.
Dorlan Bales, Wichita
Reform helping the few
Tax “reform?” I’m so sure. Our senators vote at 2 a.m. on an almost 500-page document they received earlier that night with handwritten, unreadable notes hidden in the margins. Transparent? Responsible? Accountable? Thorough? None of the above.
This is a horrifying tax scam that will be paid for by programs that Kansans want and need: education, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security — plus wind and solar energy, small businesses and so much more. Why? To shockingly escalate the federal debt to bestow permanent, mammoth tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy and corporations. We in Wichita have two of those Big Beneficiary men smiling bigly near 37th and Oliver.
Jane Byrnes, Wichita
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This story was originally published December 17, 2017 at 4:44 AM with the headline "Letters to the Editor (Dec. 17)."