War Is Hell,

Thank God SOMEONE is reminding us of what’s important and what’s happening. Over at tomdispatch dot com, he has an essay about the war costs. If you have fat fingers and don’t want to type and click, it’s 3.5 BILLION per week. Here’s an example of what you can find over there:

“By contrast, the whole international community spends less than $400 million per year on the International Atomic Energy Agency, the primary institution for monitoring and preventing the spread of nuclear weapons; that’s less than one day’s worth of war costs. The U.S. government spends just $1 billion per year securing and destroying loose nuclear weapons and bomb-making materials, or less than two days’ worth of war costs; and Washington spends a total of just $7 billion per year on combating global warming, or a whopping two weeks’ worth of war costs.

“For example, to hear the howling of the white-collar warriors in Washington every time anyone suggests knocking a nickel off administration war-spending requests, you would think that the weekly $3.5 billion outlay is all “for the troops.” In fact, only 10% of it, or under $350 million per week, goes to pay and benefits for uniformed military personnel. That’s less than a quarter of the weekly $1.4 billion that goes to war contractors to pay for everything from bullets to bombers. As a slogan, insisting that we need to keep the current flood of military outlays flowing “for Boeing and Lockheed Martin” just doesn’t quite have the same ring to it”

George W. Bush and Laura Bush were being interviewed by NBC’s Ann Curry when the subject turned to the war in Iraq. Curry reminded the President that his wife had once said, “No one suffers more than their president. I hope they know the burden of worry that’s on his shoulders every single day for our troops.” The conversation continued thusly:
“Bush: And as people are now beginning to see, Iraq is changing, democracy is beginning to tak[e] hold. And I’m convinced 50 years from now people look back and say thank God there was those who were willing to sacrifice.
“Curry: But you’re saying you’re going to have to carry that burden… Some Americans believe that they feel they’re carrying the burden because of this economy.
“Bush: Yeah, well —
“Curry: They say — they say they’re suffering because of this.
“Bush: I don’t agree with that.
“Curry: You don’t agree with that? Has nothing do with the economy, the war? The spending on the war?
“Bush: I don’t think so. I think actually, the spending on the war might help with jobs.
“Curry: Oh, yeah?
“Bush: Yeah, because we’re b u ying equipment, and people are working. I think this economy is down because we built too many houses.”
In other words, in honor of the soon-to-arrive fifth anniversary of his war without end, the President has offered a formula for economic success in bad times that might be summed up this way: less houses, more bases, more weaponry, more war. This, of course, comes from the man who, between 2001 and today, presided over an official Pentagon budget that leapt by more than 60% from $316 billion to $507 billion, and by more than 30% since Iraq was invaded. Looked at another way, between 2001 and the latest emergency supplemental request to pay for his wars (first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq), supplemental funding for war-fighting has jumped from $17 billion to $189 billion, an increase of 1,011%. At the same time, almost miraculously, the U.S. armed forces have been driven to the edge of the military equivalent of default.