BGSU was on the campaign trail for Congressman Sherrod Brown yesterday as he participated in the College Democrats Rally for Awareness on the War in Iraq and also talked to a political science class.
Brown said that the United States needs to adopt a winning exit strategy with a time table and that Condoleeza Rice’s estimate that the United States could be involved for another 10 years is not acceptable or helping the Untied States in anyway.
‘It’s just causing the Iraq and U.S. people to be less safe,’ he said.
At the rally signs read ‘32,041 dead Iraqi’s, 2,266 dead U.S. soldiers, $250 billion spent.’ The signs also displayed the names of all the U.S. soldiers killed in action.
The rally inspired both negative and positive responses Matt Bertke said, secretary of College Democrats. But these responses were not what the College Democrats were looking for.
‘We just wanted to inform people and remember all the people who have died,’ Bertke said. ‘By putting all these names on signs it allows people to see what that looked like. The signs speak for themselves’
The Iraqi War isn’t the only government decision that Brown is against.
Brown disagrees with how the education system is currently being ran by the government. He said that higher education is too expensive and more money needs to be invested by the federal government to make college more available to everyone.
He blames the tax cuts that have taken place as being the reason why college is so expensive.
‘They give tax cuts to their wealthy friends,’ Brown said. ‘It’s a question of choices, and as a result we don’t have money for education. There’s enough money, but the question is where do you spend it.’
No Child Left Behind, the federal education program, has too many tests and is underfunded by billions of dollars Brown said, who voted for the program.
Brown disagrees with the government’s international trade initiative as well.
‘All these trade agreements have allowed corporation to pull down the standard of living in the developing world,’ he said. ‘In the U.S. it causes lost jobs and hurts the safety of our food.’
The initiative to privatize social security is a big mistake Brown said.
‘Social security is actually in better shape than it was in the 80’s but by around 2029 the government will start to pay out more than it brings in,’ Brown said. ‘Privatization will not fix this problem. If social security is privatized then there would be no survivor or disability benefits.
Education and health care are Brown’s top priorities if he gets elected.
Brown, a democrat who represents the Akron area in the 13th district of Congress, is running for the U.S. Senate. The primaries are in May and the elections is in early November.
