It's April 15th. Do you know
where your tax dollars are?
The government will teU you
officially that about 27% of your
federal tax dollars go to the
military. The rest, they say, is
divided between social spending
and interest on the national
debt.
But the government is not
telling you the true story.
The truth is that 51% of your
hard-earned income tax dollars
will go to military-related
spending - almost twice what the
government is willing to admit.
Ul'l)\ ;ET
45%
for intC'rventionary � aimNl
iIIl Third rid and NOli-A" ned
nat' in the Middle East. Cenara)
and America. Africa and
Asia_
April 24 • 30, 1988 Michigan CItizen 5
turning this situation around.
We think there is far too much
money going to military waste,
Star Wars, exotic nuclear
eapons, and thou ands of U.S.
.-
family trying to buy a house?
I Are you concerned about the
quality of their, land or water?
Why are our country's farms and
manufacturing base disappear­
ing while we become th world'
largest debtor nation? Do you
w nt more of your tax dollar to
go to deal with orne of the e
problems?
The Nat ,i 0 n a I Job s wit h
.Pcacc Campaign i dedicated to
troops stationed all over the
globe. We think we can better ..
defend our country by b osting
the standard of living here, by
rebuilding our town and cities,
by cleaning up our environment,
by providing quality education
for tomorrow's job , and homes
for today's families. _
It's your money. You work
for it. Where do you want it
working for y u?
. People of color claim the progreSSiv� history Of. the Jewish people
Opiuion. Cnnuuent arv, Letters. View-
�
1 ' I
Where have a I your-tax dollars gone?
This rti e ub ittecl by· Wh th discr � -.
tio Jo With Peace y e epancy, income taxes last year, a little going up? Do they need help?
C 76 S S'_t, rust of all, the government more than $2,000 went for the Do you have a child or friend
ampa , um r ... � gl . 1 d h f ili .
Boston, MA 02110. ne eels to inc u e t e costs ? m nary. m college? How are they going
past wars, namelr. veteran s Over the past seven years, we to pay for their higher educa-\
benefits and the military share have seen the largest peacetime tion? Do you know a young
of the national debt interest.
Then the government leaves
out whole areas of military
spending like foreign military
aid and the gowing military
- share of NASA.
Furthermore, the govern­
ment makes its calculations by
including Social Security and
other "trust funds". These are
separate pools of money set
aside for specific purposes and
not paid for by our income lax
dollars. It makes little sense to
lump them into the tax/spending
ie with the military and other
budgeted government
programs.
But that's exactly what Presi­
dent Lyndon B. Johnson did in
the 1960's to hide the costs of the
Vietnam War. And,it has been
done this way ever since to make
the military share seem smaller
than it is.
So, if you include the cost of
past wars, foreign military aid,
and the defense part of NASA -
and keep separate- Social
Security and other unrelated
trust funds - you find that
military spending now claims 51
cents out of each and every one
of your federal tax dollars. Com­
pare that with less than 2 cents
for housing, 2 cents, for educa­
tion and 8 cents for health care.
It you are an average tax­
payer and paid $4,000 in federal
By Dr. Leno Ful ni
In the Israeli occupied lands
of the West Bank and the Gaza
Strip, nearly two million Pales­
tinian people live under military
occupation, in dire poverty and
despair, denied even the most
basic civil rights, democratic
rights, and human rights. ,
An entire generation of
Palestinian people has grown up
under Israeli rule. They have
come of age in a society which
denies them the right to vote for
their own leaders or even open­
ly to be leader.s, where they can
be arrested for organizing a
trade (Inion or for displayi g
their own flag.
Their own economy
strangled, young Palestinians
can look forward to no future ex­
cept - at best - to be migrant
! laborer shuttling to and from
Israel· the alternative is hunger
and unemployment.
, In response to this desperate
existence, the Palestinians, led
by the youth but acting as an en­
tire people, have risen up in
rebellion against an unjust and
brutal system with their bare,
II
hands and bodies against one of
the most powerful and sophisti­
cated military machines on
earth.
In retaliation the Israelis have
killed scores of unarmed Pales­
tinians, some of them mere
children, on the streets. The
Palestinian people have not
relented, and the Isrealis have
responded by writing new chap­
ter in the history of genocidal
practices.
Like its allies in apartheid
South Africa and fascist Chile,
Israel has declared war on an en­
tire people. The collective
punishment of families and en­
tire neighborhoods for the al­
leged crimes of individual Pales­
tinians, the arbitrary and brutal
beating and maiming of children
and the elderly alike, the killing
of prisoners in detention and the
making of an entire people into
an enemy guilty for merely exist­
ing - these policies· can only
make those familiar with Nazi
policy against the Jewish people
in Germany just prior to the
Holocaust cringe in orror and
outrage.
_ military buildup in world his­
tory. If we include only what the
government calls "defense"
spending, the military budget
has doubled since 1981 from
$140 billion to close to 300 bil­
lion in 1988.
, Now, look at your neighbor­
hood schools. Look at the roads
and bridges, the sewer and
water systems, hospitals and
housing stock. Are the costs
Daily, the practices of the Is­
reali government more and
more approach those of the H1t­
lerite mu derers of the Jewish
people 50 years ag�.
The African American
people understand what it
means to have come through a
Holocaust.
In the enslavement" and
transshipment of the African
people, who were brought to this
hemisphere to build - with their
sweat and blood and upon the
foundation of their crushed
bodies - we have lost upwards of
50 million human souls. The en­
tire continent of Africa still suf­
fers the burden of under­
development that is a direct -
result of the genocidal plunder­
ing .of its most cherished
resource - its people.
And today in America, the
African American communities
struggl against the same under­
development and repression
that has been the foundation of
American society.
lavery and the oppression of
people of color in America - -
Black, Latino, I ndian and Asian
- i as intrinsic to American
. ociety a. the genu ·ide of the
Jewish people wa. in Nazi Ger­
m' ny and the oppression of the
Palestinian people is in J rae I
and the occupied territories.
In all of these instances, as
well as in South Africa and Latin
America, enslavement and
genocide were and are con­
ducted in the name of God, from
the chattel slavery of African
Americans, to the stealing of the
Indian people's lands suppa ed
to be the divine right of
European colonialists, to the in­
human system of apar heid
Under the fascist Afrikaaners to
the atrocities committed against
the Palestinians in the name of
the "Chosen People" - a code
word in Zionist ideology.
Today, in America and
around the world, peop e of
color are leading a move ent -
the independent political move­
ment - that represents the vast
majority of humanity, the
majority that is every day fight­
ing for and building a new world
- ba cd not on oppression and ex­
ploitation but on peace,
democracy and justice. The in­
dependent, people of color-led
movement stands for democracy
and elf determination, for the
elimination of poverty and ex­
ploitation, and, as such, the
eradication of the root causes of
the genocidal policies of repres­
sive, anti-people governments
around the world.
The genocidal policies of the
Israeli government against the
Palestinian people have nul­
lified any claim that the Zionist
I state may make to be the repre­
sentatives of the interests and
aspirations of the Jewish people.
On behalf of the struggles of
people of color around the
world, and in the name of the
countless African, Asian, Latino
and Jewish victims of gen cide,
we of the independent political
movement claim the sacred
memory of the victim of th
Holocaust. In the name 0
people I of color all over th
world, we take it upon our elve
'to sever the Jewish people from
the reactionary, anti-people
jdeology of Zionism. and
Continued 0 P 16