The $3 Trillion Shopping Spree

THAT WAS FUN. Just got done spending $3 trillion. Try it yourself - it's a lot harder than you might think. Honestly, it would have been a whole lot easier just to follow the president's example and blow it all on one illegal occupation of Iraq.

$3 trillion is the projected cost of the Iraq War according to Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard lecturer Linda Bilmes. That's a whole lot of zeros, but what does it really amount to? How many homes would it buy for Americans who've fallen victim to the subprime meltdown? How many debts would it pay off for developing nations? For that matter, how many of those new Mac Air laptops would it buy me? As it turns out, one whole hell of a lot of all of those things combined.

Try it yourself: http://3trillion.org

What a colossal waste of money. What a tragedy of lost opportunities. Where is all this money going? KBR, Halliburton and the other war profiteers have made out like bandits in Iraq, while taxpayers and their own workers get screwed. KBR enjoys contracts worth $16 billion, and still avoids paying Medicare and Social Security taxes by hiring workers through shell companies in the Cayman Islands.

In the Bush Administration's defense, of course, they had no idea it would cost this much when they embarked on their insane crusade (in fact, they still don't) Along with cheering Iraqis, arsenals of WMDs, and leprechauns and unicorns, the White House expected to be presenting the American people with a much, much smaller bill for its services. Back in 2003, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld (remember him?) was fond of quoting the projected cost at $50 billion.

You may recall that about six years ago, Bush's own chief economic adviser, Lawrence Lindsey, was pushed out of the White House for suggesting that the war could cost up to a trifling $200 billion - still $2.8 trillion off the mark. "Baloney" was how Rumsfeld characterized Lindsey's estimate, before quoting the $50 billion figure.

With Rumsfeld gone, one would hope to see a little more honest accounting out of the Defense Department. So what does The Pentagon have to say about Stiglitz's sobering calculation? That number "seems way out of the ballpark to me," said Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell.

Could $3 trillion cover the cost of a worthwhile accountant at the DoD? Apparently that's the only thing it can't afford.

Comments

[stringer]

John Cusack's awesome! 1408 ruled.

Think these high-concept movies he's making, like War Inc., really are garnering a lot more attention than people realize. He was cool on Reel Time with Bill Maher too.

Keep telling the truth, John! People are catching on.

[ZeroVoices]

A couple weeks ago, I was following links that had a loose relationship. I ended up with the 1972 Shaffer report, tasked by Nixon to make a case for weed being suited for the worse classification under federal law. He tossed it in the trash after finding they took him serious and spent a year talking to folks on every side of the issue they could think of.

I don't want to argue their purpose either way, right now. It doesn't relate to what I found so compelling . . . They offer guides for making public policy that seem so obvious, but so often failed . . .

From the 1972 report . . . We are a nation of problem-solvers. We are restless and impatient with perceived gaps between the way things are and the way we think ought to be. Understandably, such an impulse toward self-correction never leaves us wanting for social problems to solve. Although it is a prerequisite to social progress, this problem-solving orientation misdirects our attention. In order to maximize public awareness we are apt to characterize situations as being far worse than they really are. Because any activity is commonly regarded as a move toward a solution, rhetoric and stopgap legislation sometimes substitute for rational reflection. We become so impressed with social engineering that we overlook inherent human limitations.

[ddharder]

Thanks for highlighting this John.

And it should be pointed out that this is a debt not to be born by future generations, but one that is being born by Americans today. The spending on the war in Iraq is a major contributor to the falling dollar. Those living in the US may not yet realize that their spending power has been chopped by over 50% in the last few years, but for those of us who live abroad it's felt big time.

I wish more voters paid attention to where all their money is going. It would at least curb the massive fraud being perpetrated on the citizens by the corporations that have much, much, much more influence over their government than the voters have.

[LiamR]

This kind of fiscal mismanagement - to put it politely - is linked to the other fiscal catastrophes we're currently experiencing. Oil prices, for example, are skyrocketing largely due to the rampant speculations of futures investors. The subprime crisis was created by greedy speculators who fleeced home owners until their was no more fleece to be fleeced (and then they blamed the home owners!). Large corporations have speculated for years that they can make products overseas to sell here without killing their golden-egg-laying goose, which is the American consumer.

The war itself was promoted by speculators, bloodthirsty power-mongering speculators, who continue to believe that somehow things will miraculously stabilize themselves in Iraq so that we can start pumping massive amounts of cheap oil, and billing the Iraqis for the "services" we've provided them for the past five years. Three-trillion bucks is nothing compared to the abundance of Iraqi oil profits, once we get a pipeline that can stay intact. I would bet anyone one-hundred dollars that somewhere in the bowels of the White House there are still conversations about how this Iraq project is going to pay off big. But then that would just be speculation on my part.

[lbrillante]

It is a great american tragedy and such a multitude of fronts.

I am so grateful that americans are at least beginning to wake up ad recognize that they have some power here.
I am very grateful to Senator Obama for being willing to fight for the leadership of this country.
We don't just need change in Washington though. We also need change in the media... and I don't know how we get there...
We need a media that tells the truth and says to us hey 'what are you doing about this' We need voices that can scream '''WAAAAAKKKK UPPP PEOPLE'''
I have to say that people with fame and likability can have an effect.
I am someone who make my own flyers against NAFTA, GATT, and the WTO back in the Clinton years... having learned about these issues through CSpan and stood at the mall and bus stops trying to inform people about how these agreements would affect our environment and our workforce/­manufactur­ing base...
But it shook me a bit when I saw SICKO and he discussed the way people in France will take to the streets in protest en masse. We are not accustomed to understanding the power of the people.
Senator Obama has been talking about it too which I appreciate. When he says it will take all of us staying involved to bring change and that he is banking on 'us'. He is offering, as are you, a wake up call.

Thank you!d

[Trittydi]

Mr. Cusack ~~

Your personal leadership on important political issues of the day are one of the reasons my 20's something children have a growing interest in the political process. Admittedly there are many things that help keep them interested -- but you are one of them. Thanks for your excellent example.

A midwest mom

**

[lisakaz2]

I did it a while ago and it was a great deal of fun. I even put up some libraries! (With books that were not "My Pet Goat.")

The water and power things are very very important tho imo. Thanks for spreading the word.

[andhakari]

I wonder how far that much money would go towards nationalizing America's hospitals and health care system -- maybe throw in gas and oil licenses which were pretty much just given away -- and maybe spending a dime or two on fixing the crappy infrastructure. Then you just might have a country that works as well as Norway.

[nintynine]

Is there a formula for restoring integrity in America? Do you think 3 trillion dollars could buy our government back for “We the People?”

The oil companies are making obnoxious profits but we’re paying $4.00 a gallon for gas. This current 7 year war is over the control of oil, but the spin has much more to do with our national security.

War is not the answer. it hasn’t been since Vietnam. Watching destruction first hand on the evening news during dinner continues to be the “old school’s” way of controlling and stimulating a political agenda.

It's time for a change!

[xtina]

John, maybe if you stood up like the real men of this country do and volunteered to defend the US and other free nations against Islamo-fascist terrorism you might see the importance of spending whatever it takes to keep us free. God Bless

[ckomeshian]

Maybe if Americans rethought the mindset that they are entitled to whatever they want (such as natural resources which often come from other nations), we'd stop inciting anger from those inconvenienced by our culture and there would be no need for a war that anybody has to volunteer for. We need to take personal responsibility for why we are in this mess.

[politicky]

xtina--

The Pentagon Strangles Our Economy: Why the U.S. Has Gone Broke
http://www.alternet.org/story/83555/

[ddharder]

Hard to know what to say in response to this much ignorance.­.. The post above is certainly an example of how effective propaganda really is on a certain segment of the population.

[ZeroVoices]

That's the spirit, kill in the name of Religion #1, (Which ever God you feel is blessing this adventure!) . . . We can go kill the folks of Religion #2- Islam, (No wonder they hate us for our freedom!) . . . then go down to gitmo, you know, where we give freedom lessons . . . unchain a few of those fascist folks . . . I lost track, do we get to kill them too? God must be on-board, right? I think I'm catching on! Oopps . . . I forgot, ONE Real Man makeover coming up . . . (John, don't worry, they do it all the time in CA!)

[indypete]

Substitute "jew" for "islamo-fascist" and you've got a rant from 1930s Germany. See how it works?

[BobEvansZombie]

How hard is it to figure out?

When you have windfall profits for one group of people in the country, and stagnant wages for the other group of people...
When military spending exceeds all else...
When an appointed, not elected, appointed president can have 50+ running scandals, including warrantless wiretaps, a war based on lies and falsehoods, and presiding over the country during the single most devastating terrorist attack on American soil and not be held accountable for ANY OF IT...

...how much more evidence do you need to tell you that America is no longer a democracy, it has become a fascist republic.

[UnbiasView]

What happened to the "end the war" theme the Democrats ran on in 2006? Why do they continue to fund this and where is Pelosi's secret Democratic plan to lower gas prices, I could sure use it right about now.

As usual, no matter if there is a D or an R next to your name you can be easily bought into funding anything as long as you get your pork projects.

[indypete]

They're all crooks. What we need is a hit of good old-fashioned socialism! Capitalism seems to have sunk into fascism so how much worse could it be?

[OneTop]

Good article John.

What did / will 3 Trillion$ + in illegal Oil wars get you ....

So far .. just to note a few

A dollar that has depreciated by 60%
10 Trillion$ in debt / $32K per capita :)
$4.00 gasoline
$5.00 diesel
Double digit inflation (real inflation)

[Charles TW]

For a nation that howled like a banchee caught in a beartrap at even the thought of having to spend more than a 100 billion dollars to recover from the effects of Katrina, it strikes me as reprehensible at a level that borders on cosmic that America is no closer to a definitive answer about recouping and repaying the borrowed three trillion dollars than we are. As your article rightly noted, Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney and their fellow neo-con war hawks insisted that the cost of the war would not exceed 50 billion dollars.
By many responsible accounts at least a half a million dead Iraqis would be alive today, and the infrastructure of the country would be in tact were it not fo ourr invasion. It seems a mindboggling leap of reason to assume that whoever assumes control of the Iraqi government will cut us a check to reimburse us for a debacle that was clearly of our making. With Halliburton no longer being an "American corporation" and companies such as Hunt Oil cutting their own private deals to dtrill the oil, we will be hard pressed to compel those who benefited most from the war to assume their fair share of the costs for waging it. And because of our arrogant and self-righteous go-it-alone posture in invadig Iraqi, do we really expect our friends and allies to help us pick up the tab to pay it?

[PADDYWHACK]

Dear John [Cusack],excellent post,but everyone knows there are no leprechauns in Iraq.I could have saved us all a lot of money with this intelligence had I but known,no one asked me.

[indypete]

It's quite possible that "Iraq" was a typo in the white house memo and in fact we were supposed to invade Ireland in order to run our cars on Jamieson's whiskey. That would explain the leprechauns. As far as unicorns..­. I have no theory. Maybe you could help, Paddy.