Iraq War Casualty

The news today that we are now officially militarily disengaged from Iraq hits me with mixed feelings, and whilst pundits ponder the meaning, purpose and success or failure of that endeavor over the years since March of 2003 I lament an unidentified casualty of the war.


Clearly 9/11 hit us hard, emotionally, psychologically and economically. We lost a lot of folks on that day when terrorists commandeered civilian airliners and used them as weapons against us. George Bush had not been President for a year when that happened. His leadership at ground zero was inspirational, and as a nation we rallied, supportive and grieving. We moved quickly from denial and shock to anger. When President Bush announced on national TV that Saddam Hussein had 48 hours to vacate Iraq or we were going in, I was shocked. I do not know how many Americans felt that this was a knee-jerk reaction to focus the national anger at terrorists, but I did. I could not recall a time when a sitting President declared war on another nation for ambiguous causes such as weapons of mass destruction and hosting terrorists’ camps. Regardless, we went in. “Shock and Awe” held totally different meanings for me.

By the fall of 2008, we had been in Iraq and now Afghanistan for over 5 years. The surplus budget Bush inherited from Clinton had become a $12 trillion dollar deficit. No one was talking national debt then. We were fighting wars. But, when the housing and banking industries collapsed that fall, we suddenly saw our economic predicament. We were deeply in debt from our war effort, and now our economy was not generating money. It was a classic time for increased federal spending to get the economy going again, but we already had a huge debt after all those years of war. Obama initiated stimulus programs, but they were frankly too little too late. We needed massive infusions of money to generate demand, but we were already in the hole. The Obama debt grew the total national debt from the $12 trillion he inherited to $15 trillion.

Now the political tide turned. Now we are worried about our debt. Be clear, 80% of our current national debt came from the deficit spending on the war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. But, in 2010, conservatives rallied a reeling nation to re-take control of the House and the new battle cry was balance the budget, shrink government, cut taxes. This battle cry was not heard during the 8 years of the Bush administration. It was heard in the first two years of the Obama administration. The debt came from the war and the sagging economy. The economy sagged during the Bush Presidency and has been slowly growing ever since. That did not matter. Now we must shrink government and cut spending.

Public education has become a major casualty of this philosophy. States have made dramatic cuts in the funding of public education. The feds, though providing stimulus packages early on to keep public education going, did so with strings attached. The federal stimulus dollars for public ed. are now gone, and states which used those dollars to shore up education are cutting.

Unlike military spending where cuts equal decreases in deployment, cuts in public education have also coincided with increased demands. Accountability is increasing. High stakes testing is even more high stakes. Teacher salaries tied to student performance is the rage. We took money away from public schools to fund charter schools. We hold systems accountable for dropouts when funding has decreased. We implement new and more rigorous curriculum standards. It is the equivalent of cutting military spending while we enter a new war and hold the troops more accountable for winning.

We could not continue to fund public education because of our debt. We got in debt because we spent so much on the wars. Public education is a casualty of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. We are a casualty, and yet we are asked to do more. We are not just the walking wounded; we are to become the high performing walking wounded.

As I read thoughtful commentators on public education I sense a deep, abiding sadness, shock, and anger. We have PTSD and it is time we admit it.

Bless each and every public school employee. Care for them. Support them. Be there for them. They are charged with the care and nurture of our future and our most precious asset: our children. Please wish to each and every one of them joy and peace this Christmas.

Good will to all and peace on earth.