Without The War In Iraq?

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Speaking from strictly a money point of view.... how would our economic situation differ today and would that money have been put to use in other ways domestically....and how specifically?

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Type: Discussion • Score: 4 • Views: 2,623 • Replies: 34

[+4] - Setanta - 11/03/2008That was stupidity even by Fox's alreay low, low standards. The Congress to which she refers, from the approval of the war powers in 2002, until they were unseated in January of 2007, was...

@Bi-Polar Bear,

What do you know about the battle for Iraq?

1 Reply

@Bi-Polar Bear,

I can 't be too specific, Bear.
I m not a hot-shot economist,
but I m sure we d be a lot better off.

From the time that we overthrew Saddam,
it stopped being a defensive war
just became a foreign aid project, at our expense.

I strongly favored overthrowing Saddam,
because (knowing that he was a homicidal maniac with a grudge against us)
I was concerned that he'd slip a mini-nuke in on us,
on a boat approaching some port city, like mine.

He 's not likely to come back any more; enuf is enuf.

W was too slow to START the war
and too slow to STOP the war.

David

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@Bi-Polar Bear,

I do not believe there is any way to determine that question, because our government is not consistent with the needs of our country vs funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. That our government can continue to increase the debt that our future generations will have to pay is unethical and immoral. They lack the brains god gave them.

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@H2O MAN,

what has that to do with my question? My speculative and rhetorical question?

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@Bi-Polar Bear,

BTW, Bear, I hope your son is feeling better.

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@OmSigDAVID,

thanks his surgery went very well and he's on the mend until next time.... and next time he falls I'll pick him up again.

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@Bi-Polar Bear,

I c u r a good parent

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@OmSigDAVID,

well, I'm a parent anyway... he could have done worse I suppose...but he could have done better as well.... I ain't exactly Ward cleaver...

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Personally, I think the war in Iraq probably curbed the government swelling out of control in the hands of a liberal Congress keen on expanding government influence as much as it possibly could. Our leaders have learned they can use our money to curry our favor, obedience, verbal support, and votes and the more they have to work with, the more they will do that. That they retain their power (and therefore increase their own fortunes) is much more important to most than whether what they buy with our money actually accomplishes anything.

Promise the people all you will do for them, and it somehow doesn't seem to register that they're going to do it with our money. Of course those who aren't contributing much or anything at all will follow one who promises utopia anywhere.

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That was stupidity even by Fox's alreay low, low standards. The Congress to which she refers, from the approval of the war powers in 2002, until they were unseated in January of 2007, was controlled by the Republicans.

Leaving aside the incredible idiocy of suggesting that waging a war reduces spending, one can hardly call a Congress in the hands of the Republicans from 1995 to 2007 a "Liberal" Congress.

Sometimes i think that silly old woman must be on drugs.

1 Reply

@Bi-Polar Bear,

Bi-Polar Bear wrote:

Speaking from strictly a money point of view.... how would our economic situation differ today and would that money have been put to use in other ways domestically....and how specifically?

Other than having a 9 trillion debt instead of a 10 trillion debt, there probably wouldn't have been any difference from a government standpoint.

What the economy would have done without all the guard being pulled out of their jobs and sent to Iraq for 18 months at a time is a different question.

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@Bi-Polar Bear,

bpb :

don't want to bother you with too many details , but estimates put the monthly cost of the war to the UNITED STATES at around $12 billion .
i imagine you might have some useful ways for spending (or saving) that kind of money .

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23551693/

from above link :

Quote:

Studies: Iraq a $12 billion-a-month war
Economists project a much higher ‘burn rate’ than government estimates
The Associated Press
updated 10:26 p.m. ET, Sun., March. 9, 2008
The flow of blood may be ebbing, but the flood of money into the Iraq war is steadily rising, new analyses show.

In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the "burn" rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book.

Beyond 2008, working with "best-case" and "realistic-moderate" scenarios, they project the Iraq and Afghan wars, including long-term U.S. military occupations of those countries, will cost the U.S. budget between $1.7 trillion and $2.7 trillion " or more " by 2017.

Interest on money borrowed to pay those costs could alone add $816 billion to that bottom line, they say.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has done its own projections and comes in lower, forecasting a cumulative cost by 2017 of $1.2 trillion to $1.7 trillion for the two wars, with Iraq generally accounting for three-quarters of the costs.

Variations in such estimates stem from the sliding scales of assumptions, scenarios and budget items that are counted. But whatever the estimate, the cost will be huge, the auditors of the Government Accountability Office say.

so even the GAO and CBO put a pretty good price tag on it .

if you want more info than you can ever handle ,
google : USA+iraq war cost

btw : trillion doesn't mean much to me - too many ZEROS (they aren't worth anything , are they ?)
hbg

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@Bi-Polar Bear,

OK, it's clear that you know nothing about the subject.

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What we are doing by introducing democracy to Iraq
may be really nifty for Iraq,
but we are paying for it with American military casualites
and with huge amounts of American treasure.

Foreign aid is unconstitutional.

W is NOT the President of Iraq.

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The war was the reason we unelected many GOPers in 96. We apparently didnt get the job done since the HOR and the USSneate seem to be incapable of bipartisan agreemenst no different than if GOPers were in power.

The war is costing about 1.7% of GDP every year. That amount is sign ificant since, in the recent meltdown, we are posed with a 5% shortfall that could have been reserved had the phony fuckin war not ever been started.

The social programs for the big businesses will keep the oligarchs happy (and the douche bags like H2O man). The rest of us (wewho can read) are incensed.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

It was Republicans who abandoned their conservative sensibilities and were acting (and spending) like liberal Democrats that had their behinds bounced out of the majority in 2006. Conservative Americans were thoroughly disgusted with the lot of them. GOP and conservative is not necessarily synonymous or these days is GOP and liberal two different things. Unfortunately a great many numbnuts out there still think the GOP is in control. You'll notice that a Democratically controlled Congress is not featured ANYWHERE on the front pages these days.

So...they're still pushing for a super majority of liberal Democrats PLUS the most liberal person ever to be elected President of the United States. God help us all.

1 Reply

@farmerman,

I see you have yet to let go of your petty hatred even though it is eating away at what is left of your little brain.

farmboy, you are not a viable human until you let go of the hate.

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@H2O MAN,

H2O MAN wrote:

I see you have yet to let go of your petty hatred even though it is eating away at what is left of your little brain.

farmboy, you are not a viable human until you let go of the hate.

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@H2O MAN,

H2O MAN wrote:

I see you have yet to let go of your petty hatred even though it is eating away at what is left of your little brain.

I guess that explains why what is right of your little brain is all that remains, the left having been eaten away long ago.

1 Reply

Without The War In Iraq?

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