What Could We Do With 12 Billion/month

If it weren't being flushed down that toilet called Iraqi Freedom.

For what we've already spent, we could have a Prius in every driveway. electric scooters and a new rail system.

With money saved from high oil prices and a few well-deserved taxes on everyone making more than 250,000, maybe we could afford a decent health-care system, which I could use right now, because after reading  this, I feel sick.

Report: Wars Costing $12 Billion a Month

    By Andrew Taylor

    The Associated Press

    Monday 09 July 2007

    Washington
- The boost in troop levels in Iraq has increased the cost of war there
and in Afghanistan to $12 billion a month, and the total for Iraq alone
is nearing a half-trillion dollars, congressional analysts say.

    All
told, Congress has appropriated $610 billion in war-related money since
the Sept. 11, 2001, terror assaults, roughly the same as the war in
Vietnam. Iraq alone has cost $450 billion.

    The figures come from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, which provides research and analysis to lawmakers.

    For
the 2007 budget year, CRS says, the $166 billion appropriated to the
Pentagon represents a 40 percent increase over 2006.

    The Vietnam War, after accounting for inflation, cost taxpayers $650 billion, according to separate CRS estimates.

    The
$12 billion a month "burn rate" includes $10 billion for Iraq and
almost $2 billion for Afghanistan, plus other minor costs. That's
higher than Pentagon estimates earlier this year of $10 billion a month
for both operations. Two years ago, the average monthly cost was about
$8 billion.

    Among
the reasons for the higher costs is the cost of repairing and replacing
equipment worn out in harsh conditions or destroyed in combat.

    But
the estimates call into question the Pentagon's estimate that the
increase in troop strength and intensifying pace of operations in
Baghdad and Anbar province would cost only $5.6 billion through the end
of September.

    If
Congress approves President Bush's pending request for another $147
billion for the budget year starting Oct. 1, the total bill for the war
on terror since Sept. 11 would reach more than three-fourths of a
trillion dollars, with appropriations for Iraq reaching $567 billion.

    Also,
if the increase in war tempo continues beyond September, the Pentagon's
request "would presumably be inadequate," CRS said.

    The
latest estimates come as support for the war in Iraq among Bush's GOP
allies in Congress is beginning to erode. Senior Republicans such as
Pete Domenici of New Mexico and Richard Lugar of Indiana have called
for a shift in strategy in Iraq and a battle over funding the war will
resume in September, when Democrats in Congress begin work on a funding
bill for the war.

    Congress
approved $99 billion in war funding in May after a protracted battle
and a Bush veto of an earlier measure over Democrats' attempt to set a
timeline for withdrawing U.S. combat troops from Iraq.

    The
report faults the Pentagon for using the Iraq war as a pretext for
boosting the Pentagon's non-war budget by costs such as procurement,
increasing the size of the military and procurement of replacement
aircraft as war-related items.

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