After dragging our nation into a prolonged war that has already racked up billions of dollars in expenses, Bush believes he should be allowed to tack another $87 billion onto the tab without explaining where the money will go. He believes that perhaps he can continue his pattern of deception.

But this time around, the American people have the right to know that every dollar we allow the President to spend goes to serve our interests and that these dollars are the last we spend in a disastrous war.

We must realize this money won’t be pulled out of a black hole. If the taxpayers of Iowa are to pay their $555.4 million share of the additional “war costs,” that money can no longer be spent on the services Americans desperately need. According to the National Priorities Project, if only our share of the pie remained on our soil, we could provide our citizens with 83,335 housing vouchers, or 13,668 elementary school teachers or provide 276,908 children with health care. Before being asked to steal funds from such projects, we must know exactly why $87 billion should be spent on a war with no exit strategy.

Most likely, a large portion of the $87 billion will be spent for purposes that will in no way benefit the people of this nation or Iraq. When we learned Bechtel, British Petroleum, Exxon-Mobil and Halliburton had received massive contracts through a closed and extremely flawed bidding process, we had reason to be concerned about where our money was going and why. Since then, we have learned a number of contractors have ignored their duties, in hopes they could squeeze a few more dollars out of our nation to pay for their life-insurance costs by claiming our soldiers could not sufficiently protect them.

When “one in three military dollars spent goes to contractors,” according to corpwatch.org, should we potentially award Bush’s campaign contributors with another $29 billion?

We, as citizens of the United States, have already been deceived by Bush. We were told that bringing democracy to Iraq would be simple and completed quickly, yet our friends and family are still dying for this purpose months later. We were told that the Iraqi citizens would welcome our soldiers as liberators, yet the tide appears to be turning against them every day. We were told the regime of Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction that presented the world with an immediate threat; however, we have yet to find one such device.

If spending more money in Iraq will create peace and prevent the deaths of American soldiers, we have an obligation to do so. However, we also have an obligation to our fellow citizens and ourselves to ensure further funds are not wasted or used to award those who have awarded Bush for his deception. We must ensure every dollar we now hand over to Bush is spent to further our interests.

Matt Denner is a senior in political science and philosophy from West Des Moines. He is the president of the ISU Campus Greens.