Bush Budget Shafts Students

In the budget George W. Bush just submitted to Congress, he proposes to increase the maximun Pell grant available to an eligible colllege student from the current $4,050 to $4,150. Too bad college cost increases aren't limited to a similar 2 1/2 percent.

Meanwhile the $25 billion already appropriated for the Afghan and Iraq Wars for 2005 will be augmented by a supplemental budget request of $80 billion for the year. Rounding the 2005 war budget down to $100 billion, if that amount was spent instead for Pell grant increases, one billion students could get the $100 raise.

Bush pushes for private investment accounts as an alternative to social security, supposedly out of his great concern for the future of our young people. If Bush is really concerned for the young, then instead of pushing to let young people invest their social security with his rich cronies, he would do more to help them be able to afford a college education. It is a sad fact that many of our young American troops only enlisted in the armed forces because they had no other means to get a college education. Significant increases in financial aid for college students could further impair our military recruiting effort, which is already hampered by the harsh realities of the cost of war being paid by our killed and wounded troops.