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Topic: What else could $500 billion have bought?
| Author | Message |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/1/2007 12:40:35 AM | show profile That's how much the Iraq war will ultimately cost if not more. What else might we have done with $500 billion? Many things. For example: -We could've instead used that $500 billion to greatly increase wind power in the U.S. Assuming developing wind power costs about $1 million per megawatt of generating capacity, we could've built 500,000 megawatts of wind power. Right now the US has somewhere around 14,000 megawatts, so we could have increased it 35-fold. - Assuming a refinery costs about $1 per gallon refining capacity, for $500 billion we could've built alternative fuel refinery capacity that would've supported the production of 500 billion gallons of alternative fuel a year. Far more capacity than we would need. We could've invested in ourselves. Instead, we used that money to start a resource war that killed tens of thousands of people, increased terrorism, displaced hundreds of thousands of people, sent more carbon emissions into the environment, and made our future clearly worse. Thanks loyal Bushie neo-cons. |
| mailbag | Posted – 5/1/2007 8:16:42 AM | show profile | email poster ? They went down from $2 TRILLION? $2,000,000,000,000.00 vs $500,000,000,000.00 |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/1/2007 11:29:45 AM | show profile You know, a hundred billion here, a hundred billion there and pretty soon you're talking about some real money. What would all that have done for social security, I wonder? |
| catlondon | Posted – 5/1/2007 1:26:41 PM | show profile This money would buy an excellent start to providing universal health care, which incidently would make the U.S. more competitive economically. Before anyone gets upset, I advocate a mix of public and private, which has worked well in other countries. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/1/2007 2:00:37 PM | show profile Yes universal healthcare is impossible, but didn't take much to get us into a disasterous war. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 5/1/2007 2:00:40 PM | show profile BushCo refuses to sign on with the Kyoto Accords saying it would cost too much and hurt the economy. He and the GOP Congress also refused to push for anti-missile defenses for all American commercial aircraft or install a cargo X-ray system in all US ports because of cost--about $10 billion for the missile defenses, and let's say $10 billion (not sure) for the ports. That's less than 2 months of Iraq, and it would make us a lot safer. Here's what else we could have done with the trillion or so that Iraq is and will cost us: $20 billion--One billion each towards research for the 20 top killer diseases in the world $5 billion--Upgrades for every veteran's hospital $10 billion--To provide soldiers with a better raise than the 2% to 3.5% piss-ant annual raises the GOP has given them in the past few years $50 billion--Funding for additional personnel and equipment for first responders in every county in the United States $30 billion--A research fund for alternative energy, including solar cells, enhanced batteries, wind power, clean coal technology (if possible), hydrogen, ethanol (including non-corn sources), etc $5 billion--Research for improved desalinization technology to make it cheaper to claim drinking water from the sea in the US and around the globe (water need being a future source of conflict) $50 billion--One-time infusion into Medicare for upcoming Baby Boomer glut $50 billion--One-time infusion into Social Security for upcoming Baby Boomer glut (though SS can be fixed by simply removing the $92K cap on SS taxes, but nobody wants to talk about that) $50 billion--To finance healthcare, particularly wellcare and disease prevention, in uninsured and underserved populations in the US $20 billion--Additional funding for education, HeadStart programs, women's abuse shelters, homeless shelters, etc $20 billion--Additional funding for foreign (NON MILITARY) aid in countries around the world--education, health, small-scale projects $20 billion--Research and development of lower-polluting mass-transit programs (magLev, electric buses and trains, etc) That's a start. And that's only $350 billion! Say, why don't we take the other $650 billion that BushCo and the GOP have funneled to Halliburton, Lockheed, Blackwater, ExxonMobil and the rest and--call me crazy--return it to the American taxpayer! |
| Mag Girl | Posted – 5/1/2007 3:23:14 PM | show profile Not to be crass, but it also could have more than bought the head of Osama bin Laden (AKA, our real enemy) and those of his cronies too. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 5/1/2007 3:56:53 PM | show profile Sending a lot more troops into Tora Bora in December 2001 would have done the same thing, but then BushCo wouldn't have had as good an excuse for his Iraq Attaq, and his connected pals wouldn't have gotten as rich. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/1/2007 4:42:23 PM | show profile The whole thing is just so heartbreaking. All so a few companies could make more money. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 5/1/2007 4:51:14 PM | show profile That was a part, ugo, but it was also about a collection of neocons and fellow travelers with a boatload of hubris who figured they could steal Iraq, pacify it, give it a veneer of democracy (except on things that truly count), steal the oil, flip Saudi Arabia the bird, use Iraq as America's new military outpost in the Mideast, and sit on the world's biggest oil tap, thus becoming "The Decider" on who gets and who doesn't (that especially means China). Didn't quite work out that way. But hubris will do that. |
| mailbag | Posted – 5/1/2007 5:02:33 PM | show profile | email poster My gripe remains: This nation should not spend a penny outside our borders until every one of its citizens are accounted for, being cared for, and we have a supreme k-12 public education system. So, for (I still say the fig is more than $500biggies it was $600 billion 1.5 years ago) all of that money that went to Iraq, we have just as stupid as ever k-12 education. More are without healthcare since 2003. We have the highest incarceration rate of any industrialized nation. And best of all -- the government expects that YOU and ME will be paying them that $1 trillion to cover for their spending in Iraq. Sick - really sick. Gives me a headache to think about it as the slave I am to their whims. We have no say without a total revolution - now I advocate guns and cannons overtaking DC. Revolt. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 5/1/2007 5:16:13 PM | show profile Before we all go painting big circles around our anarchy stars, mailbag, gotta point out that violence is usually a bad idea and somehow I don't see a violent revolt getting healthcare to the masses anytime soon. Now a nonviolent revolt where Americans wake up and demand that their politicians work for them and not the corporations for a change, now that would be nice. Not likely, but nice. |
| mailbag | Posted – 5/1/2007 7:08:18 PM | show profile | email poster Been preaching a nonviolent revolt since 2001. :) Got nowhere of course. No surprise in this apathetic country. Until 80% are in the bottom of survival (really starving like the 13% current rate) nothing will change here I'm sure. Go forth and make money to pay for our war games. New an improved weapons of mass destruction are on order for the USA's military machine (and the UK's for that matter.) Must be planning to invade another solar system since no one left to invade on earth. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/1/2007 7:16:59 PM | show profile Education, certainly another priority not being addressed because we're too busy screwing our future. Yeah, I'm on the non-violent track myself. Really now, how might the world be different if the world was run by women (and yes I know there are exceptions out there who are NOT non-violent, like Thatcher, etc.). Mailbag, I'm not criticizing you, I assume you're just venting and God knows if you're not venting these days you must be stone cold dead to what's happening in the world. |
| mailbag | Posted – 5/2/2007 2:13:43 PM | show profile | email poster I agree with the women thing Ugo. imo men have fucked-up this world more than any child, woman, elephant, or fish could (ever.) See what happens when men get little dicks? They compensate for it with weapons... Penis envy is something we can't fight I guess. What do women envy? (Really, deep down, not surface stuff like men have with body parts.) |
| hank | Posted – 5/2/2007 10:58:36 PM | show profile All so a few companies could make more money. All in one sentence, neat! |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/2/2007 11:02:16 PM | show profile Well hank, in truth Keltoi put it more accurately. So hanky what do you have to say for your beloved Bush these? Are you still a loyal? |
