I was reading an article from a British periodical the other day (don’t worry, it was for class) and it said the weirdest stuff. The author was talking about fixing up British cities. Now this wasn’t all that weird. We in America talk about it all the time. We talk about small pockets of optimism in a handful of our major cities. Some calls for the implementation of successful programs to end the deterioration of our cities and the poverty that comes with it fall on deaf ears.

But what was weird about this story was the fact that they were talking about making the revitalization of their slums a national program that had some chance of succeeding. I was proud of the little island, while in the back of my mind I was solidifying the assumption that so many had instilled within me: America’s problems are too big for a real fix. I mean, seriously, how much money would it take to deal with the social “black eyes” of this country?

We would need $112 billion to renovate and upgrade our schools. To help give low-income children a brighter future through the Head Start program, we would need $44 billion. And to provide adequate healthcare to our nation’s veterans, we need about $3 billion on top of that.

And these are just examples. Now you can see why many Americans are a little pessimistic about “fixing” problems with national social programs. This is really too bad. It would be nice to fight poverty and poor education and starvation and stuff. Don’t you agree?

Well, I’m glad you said that, because maybe there is a solution after all. On Friday a very respectable organization will provide some answers as to where such money might come from. In fact, the organization is so respectable, that they run our school. That’s right, it’s the Catholic Church, and they have got some pretty wild things to say.

It’s wild because we certainly don’t hear it very often. George W. started a long time ago talking about a need to “beef up” the military. He claims that this nation is weak, and that we are not prepared. Al Gore recognized this as well and added to the cry. The fact is, they’re right. We do not have the funding to be prepared for an immediate response to a military conflict. But, on the other hand, the budget boost for the Pentagon this year is more than one third greater than the complete annual military budgets of such “dangerous” states as North Korea, Iraq and Iran combined. We spend more than eight times the cash on the military as we do on education. If we took five percent of the U.S. military budget, we could meet the basic health and nutrition needs of all the world’s poorest people. So what’s the problem here? Why are we spending all this money and still not being prepared? Because the Pentagon is a little weak, and by weak, I mean like a spineless bug.

Since the end of the Cold War, defense contractors have felt the pinch. The Pentagon has been pressured to keep these companies profitable, and has therefore been neglecting our nation’s needs. While the candidates are addressing the needs of military personnel in the areas of better housing, better salaries and better benefits, leaders from both parties are stealing from the soldiers. They take money out of budget increases, and put it into inefficient and often unnecessary weapons-development programs. And with every increase for the Defense Department, the problem gets worse. Every time the president or Congress initiates a budget hike, the money goes straight out of the pockets of our soldiers and right into the hands of wealthy weapons manufacturers.

Sure, the candidates like to talk about increasing military spending. It puts their donors at ease.

On Friday, Pax Christi is calling for our money to come back. The wastefulness is no longer acceptable. The money is better spent on helping our nation get back to its priorities, which are to educate our children, to feed our citizens and to provide opportunities for our people. It should be used to give us a military that is prepared to protect us, not one that pours extravagant amounts of cash into planes that don’t perform (like the F/A-18 E/F, which costs $3 billion a year, the cost of providing for the veterans). It should be used to make sure that the 11 million children who don’t have health care get it.

I encourage anyone who believes that their government isn’t spending enough on them to attend some of the presentations on Friday. There will be two in the quad at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., and then a detailed discussion on the topic of decreasing military spending at 5 p.m. in the Boland Room. Let’s encourage our representatives to spend our money in effective ways and tell them that the buck stops with us.