Government Favors Guns for Egypt over Air-conditioning for U.S. Elementary Students

10.05.2012

Many U.S. school kids go to class without air-conditioning, including year-round schools. Schools say it’s just too costly. Yet your government takes billions of your tax dollars each year to arm countries such as Egypt. (Image Credit: Standard-Examiner. Image modified with red “x” and text by NetAdvisor.org Staff).

Government Favors Guns for Egypt over Air-conditioning for U.S. Elementary Students

original article written by Net Advisor™

Where it’s hot, USA. During the spring, summer and early fall months, many if not most schools around the U.S.A. have little or no air-conditioning for kids (Sources: Standard-Examiner, Las Vegas Review Journal, Scripps Interactive, Haverford, Voice of San Diego, The Free Library, Tennessee News).

There have been studies on education, classroom climate and child-performance dating back to 1931 – when most school still didn’t exist in this country (Source: University of Georgia PDF share link).

We found and have archived over 40 reports, articles, research studies, and even case law that discuss air quality issues, safety and yes, air-conditioning in classrooms. Here are just a few of them:

  • Environmental Health Conditions, Portable Classrooms (CA EPA) (PDF 203pps link)
  • Healthy Schools Air Quality Standards by State (PDF)
  • Study Classroom Achievement and Building Environments in VA (PDF 148pps)
  • Links to Case Law (Source: Justia.com)
  • Lawyer’s Opinion on Classroom Air Quality (CA) (PDF)
  • Portable Classrooms Study (CA Air Resources Board) (PDF 167pps)
  • Potential Effects of Poor Indoor Air Quality (CA Air Resources Board) (PDF)
  • Associations Classroom CO2 Concentration & Student Attendance (WSU PDF 14pps)

There are over 3,000 year-round schools in the USA since 2001, and the U.S. has a laundry list of potential indoor environmental issues (Source: U.S. CPSC).

If kids really knew what was going on, it might go something like this:  ‘Hello Mr. President: The reason why some of have our shirts off is that it is hot in here. We don’t have A/C so we stand by the window. We spend much of our day not learning, but try to keep cool to avoid suffering from heat stroke. By the way, how come we give billions of tax dollars to counties who don’t like us in the Middle-East, and yet we hear all the time there is ‘no money for education’ let alone air-conditioning? (Image: White House Photo)

Education Takes Back Seat to Arming the Middle-East
The Obama Administration and prior other administrations all seem to be under the impression that with money, various aid, handing out weapons, etc., that the U.S. can dictate “peace” or “policy” to counties that basically don’t like us. The current and past Administration have spent about $4 Trillion in the Middle-East.

“Conservatively estimated, the war bills already paid and obligated to be paid as of June 2011 are $3.2 trillion in constant dollars. A more reasonable estimate puts the number at nearly $4 trillion.”

— Source: Costs of War.org (as of 06-2011)

New Jersey High School students walk near classroom trailers used to deal with overcrowding. Many trailers are built without air-conditioning citing costs and an issue. (Image Credit: Express-Times File Photo)

Those same funds could be used to reduce the U.S. deficit, improve our education system, or just add air-conditioning in K-12 schools in high climate areas. Unfortunately, education or kids learning in a classroom trailer that can hit 96 degrees isn’t a priority of government, or we would see some policies favoring education over say giving $1 Billion of Ak-47’s and other military hardware to say Egypt.

“The United States has given Egypt an average of $2 billion annually since 1979, much of it military aid, according to the Congressional Research Service.”

— Source: Reuters, 01-29-2011

The Administration talks a big game about education, and investment in education. But the reality is very little money actually goes into education compared to funds we have spent in the Middle-east.

Foreign Policy Logic?
The U.S. has been arming Egypt ever since it signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979. Last year, Egypt warned the United States not to put conditions on giving them billions of U.S. tax dollars.

“If you insert new conditions, hinting at the fact the military aid might be touched in the future, this signals to the Egyptian military [that] the United States is not as solidly behind us as we think,” the Egyptian official said.

— Source: Washington Post, 09-29-2011

Under threat of bad future relations, the U.S. runs over and hands Egypt your billion+ of annual tax dollars. In the mean time, Snoops said in 2003 (among most Middle-Eastern counties) that Egypt for example, votes against the United States at 79% of all United Nations issues.

We picked on Egypt in this report because data was very easy to find, and it was related to our other recent reports in the Middle-East.

If the U.S. was really serious about education,  we would take a hard look at where and what we are spending money on, especially in the Middle-East and redirect a “fair share” portion back to a proper domestic education environment.

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