Harry Reid on putting America’s best interests into focus

Sunday, Aug. 5, 2007 | 1:16 a.m.

Editor's note: In August the Where I Stand column is turned over to guest writers. Today's columnist is Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.

The attacks our country suffered on Sept. 11, 2001, were a tragic reminder of the grave challenges and growing threats we face every day.

Democrats and Republicans responded to those attacks by putting all partisanship aside in pursuit of a common and determined purpose: waging a global war on terror that would eliminate Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida.

We took an important first step by sending troops into Afghanistan. But just as our brave troops were making real progress i n the war on terror, President Bush steered us way off course with the misguided invasion of Iraq.

Make no mistake: I fully support all of our troops, but the mission they have been given by the Bush administration has been poorly designed from the very beginning.

Now, nearly five years into the Iraq war and six months into President Bush's latest troop escalation, we continue to pay a tragically high price for his mistakes. More than 3,600 Americans have died and tens of thousands more troops have been wounded.

Our military is stretched nearly to the breaking point without proper rest or equipment, and now there is news that al-Qaida has rebuilt itself to pre-9/11 strength. We see and hear about these grim realities every day.

But there are other, lesser-known costs of the war that impede our prosperity and threaten our safety right here at home. The Iraq war now costs us $10 billion per month. That's $120 billion of American taxpayer dollars each year. And let's be clear: That money comes right out of your family's pocket.

We're spending $10 billion per month in Iraq, but our schools here in Nevada don't have the supplies they need. We're trying desperately to build an effective police force in Iraq, but our own police and firefighters lack the equipment they need. We're building ambitious infrastructure projects in Iraq, but our own roads are overcrowded and increasingly neglected.

With so much of our money being spent on the war, it hasn't been easy to make progress on the issues we face here at home. But the new Democratic Congress, with help from a few courageous Republicans, has taken important steps forward.

We passed a 3.5 percent pay increase for our troops and improved health care funding for our veterans when they return home.

In the balanced budget we passed earlier this year we provided relief to Nevada's working families by cutting middle-class taxes by $180 billion. We also gave Nevada families a raise this year by increasing the minimum wage for the first time in more than a decade.

In July we invested in Nevada students by passing the Higher Education Access Act, which will increase the average grant for Nevada college students by $420 next year. This will be welcome relief for Nevada students who are graduating with an average debt of $16,687.

We also helped Nevada's children by expanding access to health care through the Children's Health Insurance Program and passed the most sweeping ethics reform in our nation's history to clean up Washington.

These accomplishments are a good start. But every day I think of how much more we could do if we weren't sending $10 billion every month to Iraq.

Our troops, including hundreds from Nevada, have done an outstanding job. They have met every challenge with flying colors, from toppling a dictator to putting in place the building blocks for a new democracy. But now it is time for the Iraqi government to step up and take control of its own country so that our troops can return home and refocus their mission on the war on terrorism that has been neglected by the president for five long years.

Americans voted for change last November, and Democrats in Congress have heard that call. Our progress hasn't come easy. We've faced Republican roadblocks at every turn. But we will keep fighting every day to end the Iraq war and focus on making our country safer and stronger by fighting the real war on terror - and addressing the issues that really matter to families in Nevada and throughout America.