I just returned from an official mission in Iraq to evaluate the status of military, political and reconstruction efforts, which are being paid for with your tax dollars and carried out by many of your sons and daughters.

A formal report will be delivered soon to Congress, but as your representative, I wanted to give you a quick overview first.

What I saw was that we have the finest servicemen and women in the world. They are serving with courage and incredible skill, and we are fortunate to have Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker in charge.

Gen. Petraeus explained that many factors contributed to the recent decrease in ethnic killings: the increase in U.S. troops and a simultaneous increase of approximately 140,000 Iraqi forces, the long-awaited truce with Shia religious leader Muqtada al-Sadr, and recent military successes by the al-Maliki government in suppressing violent Shia militia in Basra.

The result? A fragile order and barely controlled chaos.

During my discussions with Gen. Petraeus, I learned that, to secure the 2.5 million Iraqis living in Baghdad’s Sadr City, it was necessary to surround the area with a tall, concrete barrier, keeping the citizens in and violent extremists out.

Even so, the day after we visited, several suicide bombers killed scores of innocent people. Concrete walls and more soldiers aren’t enough to secure peace in Iraq. A lasting peace requires a political solution.

Strong leadership, not terrorists, should determine who lives and who dies, and Ambassador Crocker offered a glimmer of hope.

The week before we arrived, Sunni and Shia legislators voted together, something they have not previously done because long-standing ethnic differences.

This is a rare and precious moment in time, an opportunity to work together. Only time will tell if they make the most of it.

We’re spending $400 million every day in Iraq, building schools, medical clinics, water treatment facilities, electric power plants and other critical infrastructure. Yet, when we met with U.S. inspectors in Baghdad responsible for keeping track of our tax dollars, they reported that they’re unable to travel to many of the new construction sites to examine facilities firsthand due to security concerns.

Instead, they rely on satellite images of the worksites. Oversight has become overflight.

Our soldiers have done everything we’ve asked of them, working in 140-degree heat and sandstorms that pump debilitating debris into their lungs. They are worn out — and so are U.S. taxpayers.

The reality is that we’re in the middle of an endless civil war that has no military solution, only a political one, according to those who know it best — our political ambassadors and military generals on the ground.

We’ve done what we can for the people of Iraq, while deferring our own needs here at home.

Rather than spending more of our hard-earned tax dollars rebuilding their country, it’s time to invest our money in our own communities again.

The Iraqi people can pay for their own construction projects. After all, they have a budget surplus from their windfall oil profits, while we’re paying record prices at the pump and sinking further into debt, due to our dependence on foreign oil and the administration’s failed borrow-and-spend economic policies.

It’s also time to move our brave soldiers away from Iraq. We should refocus our efforts on our real enemies — Osama bin Laden and his followers — and bring the rest of our soldiers, including those in our National Guard, home to the heroes’ welcome they’ve earned.

I heard it directly from our top military commander during my visit to Iraq: Our troops are stretched thin and can’t continue to tolerate the strain of an open-ended involvement in a never-ending religious civil war on the other side of the world.

Let’s move from “bring ‘em on” to “bring ‘em home.” Then, we can redirect the resources we’re spending over there to what matters most — higher-wage jobs, access to affordable health care, comprehensive services for our veterans and their families, better public schools and more affordable colleges, cleaner air and water, and a stronger economy for all of our Wisconsin communities.

[Join the conversation about this column on the Appleton Post-Crescent website]

By Vanessa Miranda

The key to paying college tuition is starting to save early.

“But if that doesn’t happen, students can look at ways of minimizing the costs and expenses,” said James Roman, assistant director of financial aid at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.

Roman participated in a forum Monday with Congressman Steve Kagen at UW-Green Bay to talk about student loans and increasing access to higher education for Northeastern Wisconsin residents. It also featured an education loan manager from Associated Bank and financial aid specialists from St. Norbert College, UW-Green Bay and Northeast Wisconsin Technical College.

“It is not too late for families and students to get the financial assistance that they may require to get technical school education or the college education that is required today for them to make the most of their lives,” Kagen said.

Read the full article on the Green Bay Press-Gazette website

Congressman Steve Kagen is trying to make lives easier for students attending universities and technical colleges.

The Appleton Democrat held a forum Monday in Green Bay along with financial aid specialists to discuss student loans.

Representative Kagen said it’s important for more students to have the opportunity for higher education.

“More than any other state, Wisconsin invests in higher education. That is appropriate because it is our children’s education that will determine the health and the economic vitality in all of our communities,” he said.

WBAY TV Website

By Ellen Ferguson

WASHINGTON — Northeast Wisconsin combat veterans will be able to get counseling and other outreach services closer to home with the Veterans Affairs Department decision to open a Vet Center in Brown County.
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The county is among 39 communities VA officials announced as new Vet Center sites today. The center in Brown County would be Wisconsin’s third such facility, joining centers in Milwaukee and Madison.

The VA’s network of 232 centers offers services ranging from employment advice to mental health counseling for post-traumatic stress disorder and military sexual trauma to bereavement counseling for families to information and referral to community resources.

Gerald Polus, director of the Brown County Veterans Service Office, said the center is needed. His office refers about 10 veterans a month to Milwaukee for service.

“We see young returning vets from Iraq and Afghanistan. I would say well over 30 percent have readjustment problems, ” Polus said.

Polus credited Rep. Steve Kagen, D-Appleton, and other congressional lawmakers with helping to push for a Brown County center. Kagen’s office called him this morning with the news. The delegation also sought a center for La Crosse.

“We’ve been waiting for that phone call,” Polus said. “It’s a great program.”

“The addition of this new Vet Center is great news and will contribute to a growing and actively engaged network in Brown County that provides our veterans with the benefits they have earned,” Kagen said.

Read the full article at the Green Bay Press-Gazette

…On June 20, the House passed a compromise bill regarding the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Standing up for the U.S. Constitution (The Fourth Amendment) and true to his oath of office, our 8th Congressional District Rep. Steve Kagen, D-Appleton, voted against this legislation, even though it was endorsed by the Democratic leadership of Nancy Pelosi. How refreshing it is to witness our congressperson think for himself and do the right thing, be it a politically advantageous decision or not.

This bill, which now goes to the Senate, protects companies from lawsuits if they aid in collecting information on law-abiding citizens of the United States of America. As Kagen pointed out, our executive branch already has the tools to protect both our people and our homeland by securing the approval of the courts for such action, thus properly employing our system of governmental checks and balances outlined in the Constitution, the sacred blueprint of our American democracy.

Donald Vineburg

Read the full article on the Green Bay Press Gazette website

By NIKKI YOUNK

Staff Writer

IRON MOUNTAIN - U.S. Rep. Steve Kagen, M.D., D-Wis, toured through the area this week to promote his policies ahead of the November election.

Kagen represents the eighth district of Wisconsin, which includes Florence and Marinette counties.

The Niagara mill shutdown and rising gas prices are the two most important issues that Kagen believes his constituents face.

He wants to assure voters that he and his team in Washington, D.C., are working hard to bring about change.

“As Niagara goes, so goes our nation,” Kagen said in reference to economic hardship in the United States as a result of overseas competition.

“Our government needs to uphold trade rules. Businesses cannot compete with the government, and the government is allowing Chinese-made paper into our marketplace,” he continued.

“We need a level playing field.”
…

The rising cost of fuel is Kagen’s other main concern for his district.

“These impossible gas prices punish rural areas the most; it prevents people from getting to work, since there are no buses or other forms of public transportation,” he said.

According to Kagen’s reports, 30 to 40 percent of the price of oil is manipulated and has nothing to do with supply and demand. He claims that oil companies have sufficient oil to meet the country’s needs, but choose to reward stockholders with funds instead of passing savings along to customers.

“They’re doing the right thing business-wise, but maybe they should be doing what’s right for the country,” Kagen stated.

“We want to work with the oil companies; I’m looking for solutions, not people to blame,” he continued.

Kagen also advocates drilling for oil on American soil in places like Texas, Oklahoma, and Wyoming. He recently voted for a bill that would force oil companies to drill on every oil-containing acre that they own or to turn the rights over to a company that will. Currently, his team is working on legislation that would compel American oil companies to sell fuel to American citizens first, at prices they can afford.

In the long term, Kagen supports “increased investments in renewable sources of energy” to fulfill our energy needs and create new jobs.

“It will require several years, and a bipartisan approach, for these new technologies to significantly reduce our need for fossil fuels,” he said.

Read the full article on the Iron Mountain Daily News website

For members of the U.S. Congress who haven’t lost touch with the reason they are in Washington, summer is an opportunity to spend time in their home districts listening to the concerns of constituents.

Rep. Steve Kagen (D-8th) has spent the last month traveling across northeastern Wisconsin, and now he is speaking out about the effect of rising gas prices on his district’s residents.

“It’s an economic Katrina. We have to do something right now to alleviate the pressure of these rising gas prices and we also have to plan for the future,” he said in a phone interview on Wednesday.

Kagen advocates a three-pronged approach for combating rising prices that he believes could bring the price of gasoline down by $2 per gallon. The approach involves increasing oil drilling in the United States, investing in alternative energy technologies, and preventing speculators from driving up prices artificially.

“We need to drill for new oil here in America. We have over 100 billion barrels of oil beneath our land right now and most of that land is already owned by oil companies. You have an oil company that owns the lease to the land and we have to say to that company, ‘Use it or lose it,’” Kagen said.

Kagen said Wisconsin is blessed to have access to the UW’s research on alternative fuels, and he believes cellulostic ethanol could be an important investment for the future. But he was quick to say that ethanol cannot be the only solution. Kagen advocates the expanded use of wind, solar, and nuclear power to satisfy the country’s ever-increasing demand.

“We can’t grow our way out of this problem. We have to pursue all the different options. I’m for all forms of energy to get us off Middle Eastern oil. We have to stop shaking hands with our enemies,” he said.

Kagen said that he and his fellow legislators were working hard to develop policies to make it more difficult for speculators to drive up prices.

“Wall Street speculators have locked up oil on their computers. If you’re going to purchase oil, you should be prepared to possess it,” he said.

Read the full article on The Daily News website

by Brian Moon

Congressman Steve Kagen (D- Appleton) calls the Bush administration’s energy plan, “drilling and burning, drilling and burning.” The President called on Congress Wednesday to lift the ban on off shore domestic drilling.

While speaking to reporters, Kagen says oil firms aren’t even using what land they have now. He claims oil companies have tapped only 12 million acres of the 80 million that has been leased to them.

Read the full article on the WRN website

Peterson: Higher gas prices needed to force changes

By Ed Byrne

FREEDOM — Rep. Collin Peterson flew Sunday into northeast Wisconsin to attend the Outagamie County Breakfast on the Farm and visit an experimental manure-to-energy project at the Wiese Brothers Farms in Greenleaf.

Peterson, D-Minn., who chairs the House Agriculture Committee, also endorsed the re-election bid of Rep. Steve Kagen, D-Appleton, who serves on the committee.

Kagen is being challenged by Republican John Gard, whom he defeated two years ago.

Peterson credited Kagen for helping to get the Milk Income Loss Contract program in the new farm bill.

“I look at the farm bill as the most important economic stimulus package we have,” Kagen said. “It is long term, it takes a while to grow the products and get the marketplace going, but for rural America it is the most important economic success story.”

Read the full article on the Appleton Post-Crescent website

When your expenses exceed your income, your upkeep will be your downfall. That old adage is just as true for your family’s budget as it is for the federal government that’s spending your hard-earned tax dollars.

That’s why the first vote I cast after voters sent me to Washington was to stop the secretive way politicians had created to fund their pet projects through anonymous “earmarks.” In 2006 alone, President Bush asked for $20 billion in this type of secretive funding.

But now, our new reforms are bringing necessary openness and accountability to the budgeting process, so anyone who suggests spending your money has to put their name next to the request — providing taxpayers with information they need to decide whether projects are good investments or just plain pork.

Make no mistake, there’s a big difference.

In the past year, I’ve helped secure $450,000 for the College Avenue bridge in Appleton, $490,000 for the Outagamie County Regional Airport, $446,500 for the FoxComm emergency communication system and $980,000 for the U.S. 41 construction project from Oconto to Peshtigo — all worthwhile investments that will improve the economy of every community in the Fox Cities.

A good example of how these worthwhile public investments can make a positive difference in people’s private lives is the water treatment plant in Peshtigo.

When Mayor Tom Strouf asked Sen. Herb Kohl and me to help, the city’s water system was out of compliance with Environmental Protection Agency standards because of the high level of radium in the water. Without federal aid, residents of Peshtigo would have seen their water bills increase excessively, inhibiting the economic development of the city.

No responsible leader would turn his back on the people of Peshtigo when asked to help. Sen. Kohl and I certainly didn’t, and $492,200 in federal funding later, the city is on its way to guaranteeing residents safe drinking water.

I have proudly put my name next to $25 million in investments for northeast Wisconsin, from dredging the Green Bay harbor to expanding the emergency room in Marinette and developing the riverfront in downtown Green Bay. I stand behind each of these proudly and the other investments, which are returning federal tax dollars to our region, spurring job creation and strengthening our communities.

For years, Wisconsin taxpayers have sent more money to Washington than we have received in return. But that’s changing. Given the option, I think it makes sense to spend our hard-earned tax dollars right back here in Wisconsin where they belong.

Rep. Steve Kagen: 920-380-0061 or kagen.house.gov

Appleton Post-Crescent