http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Your_bill_for_US_wars_8000_1024.html

Wednesday October 24, 2007

Bush wars to cost 40 times higher than original estimates; $8,000 per
man, woman child in US

Nick Juliano


New estimates show Iraq, Afghanistan will cost US $2.4 trillion; White
House refuses to provide estimate

The United States is spending about $8,000 per man, woman and child in
the country to pursue wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to new
estimates that show the wars will cost about $2.4 trillion over the
next decade.

More than one-fourth of the money spent in Iraq and Afghanistan --
$705 billion -- will go to paying interest on the wars' costs, which
are being funded with borrowed dollars, according to an estimate to be
released Wednesday by the Congressional Budget Office.

Iraq accounts for about 80 percent of the costs with a $1.9 trillion
tab, including $564 million in interest, a House budget committee
staff director told USA Today, which reported the numbers Wednesday
morning.

http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20071024/1a_lede24_dom.art.htm?loc=i
nterstitialskip

"The number is so big, it boggles the mind," Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-IL)
told the newspaper.

The CBO previously estimated the war's costs at $1.6 trillion, which
did not include interest payments or Bush's latest request for an
extra $46 billion in war funding.

Since President Bush decided to invade Iraq in early 2003, the war's
costs have skyrocketed as government number-crunchers continue to
revise their estimates.

The latest estimate is more than 40 times higher than the Bush
administration's initial estimates that the war would cost between $50
billion and $60 billion; meanwhile a proclivity for cutting taxes has
marked Bush's tenure almost as much as his dedication to mounting
international invasions.

The latest CBO report puts government estimates in line with those
from outside economists, who have long warned against the
war-on-the-cheap pipe dreams of Bush and his allies.

In 2002, Yale economist William Nordhaus estimated the war would cost
$1.6 trillion by 2012,

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/nation/epaper/2007/10/08/m1a_WARCOST
S_1008.html
and last year Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said the
costs could exceed $2 trillion.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/nation/epaper/2007/10/08/m1a_WARCOST
S_1008.html

Responding to the latest estimate, White House spokesman Sean
Kevelighan refused to provide USA Today with an administration
estimate of the war's cost, but he couldn't resist accusing Democrats
of "playing politics" and "trying to artificially inflate" funding
levels.

The CBO assumed that 75,000 troops will remain in Iraq a decade from
now in calculating the estimate.

Although it is "very speculative," that estimate is far from
unreasonable, Loren Thompson, a nonpartisan defense analyst at the
Lexington Institute, told the newspaper.

Already, the wars' $604 billion price tag is higher than than the
costs of conflicts in Korea and Vietnam, when adjusted for inflation,
according to a report from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary
Assessments.

http://www.csbaonline.org/4Publications/PubLibrary/U.20070913.The_Cost_of_US_O
pe/U.20070913.The_Cost_of_US_Ope.pdf

____________________________________________________

Yup. No matter how ya slice it, it sure seems like a lota dough.

Harry