Where does the money go?

How much money does it cost to run this war?

I tried to find out through the internet and this is all I can come up with.

The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the cost of "prosecuting" a war against Iraq at up to $9 billion per month.

One source, dated March 2006 said it costs at least $200 million a day. That works out to $6 billion per month.

Another source, dated September 2006, put it at nearly $2 billion a week. That works out to $8 billion a month, still in the ballpark.

Another source, dated January 2007, said that we have spent over $1.2 trillion.

That is a staggering amount of money to spend on anything. And what have we gotten for it?

We have had to buy new helicopters, tanks, troop transports, ammunition and weapons to replace that which was destroyed fighting this war. We have bought fuel and maintenance services to keep this equipment running. We have bought food to feed the military and new uniforms to clothe them. We have paid the salaries of support contractors and reservists that normally would not have been needed. We have paid and still are paying to rebuild Iraq.

That is a lot of money to cover these things. I am not convinced that these things actually cost this much.

Nor am I convinced that this was the best use of this money.

It is very easy to hide illegal and inappropriate spending when you are dealing with such a large sum of money. And given the fact that neither George W Bush nor anyone else in the White House can be trusted, I am willing to bet that a lot of illegal spending took place behind closed doors that cost the American ‘tax-donors’ a lot more money than it should have.

I as a taxpayer should be able to learn how much of my money is being spent on this war and where that money is going. I should be able to access more than data that is outdated at best.

Aside from the fact that the U.S. government would never release ‘actual’ figures to someone as lowly as one of the millions who actually supplies the money for this dark-hole, I wouldn’t be able to trust the figures as true.

Let’s take a look at how that money would have been better spent.

We could have funded Social Security for decades.

We could have developed the most complete public health care system in history.

Medical research could very possibly have been years ahead of where it is now.

Countless people’s lives would have been saved in poverty stricken countries around the world if the money had been spent there.

Our education system would have been second to none. Just think of what we could accomplish with the most highly educated people in the world living right here in the U.S.

Parenting programs to teach parents how to raise their children to be more responsible could be funded.

After funding all of these more practical issues, we would have had enough left over to have an extensive national security system that would protect us from the very terrorists that George W Bush says is best fought in Iraq.

The findings of the 9/11 commission were held up due to costs. ‘Costs’ would not have been a valid reason had this illegal war not been started. Recommendations such as better cargo screening, stronger measures against nuclear proliferation, and a larger force in Afghanistan to stop the Taliban would have been given the green light.

In addition to saving this money for more practical things, we would not have lost over 3,000 military personnel. Medical care for those wounded individuals who made it back will cost us even more and put an even bigger strain on an already over-burdened VA system. And the lost productivity of these killed or wounded soldiers is immeasurable.

This amounts to a colossal mis-use of funds. Our tax dollars are at the command of people who have their priorities all screwed up.