It can't be said too often: the biggest budget buster was the Iraq War

[cali]

That's one good reason to still be pissed at dems who voted for the humanitarian and fiscal disaster that was the Iraq war.

The Iraq War, something we ignore, has been as big a fiscal disaster for this country as it has been a humanitarian disaster for Iraq.

The decade-long American wars in Afghanistan and Iraq would end up costing as much as $6 trillion, the equivalent of $75,000 for every American household, calculates the prestigious Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

Remember, when President George Bush’s National Economic Council Director, Lawrence Lindsey, had told the country’s largest newspaper “The Wall Street Journal” that the war would cost between $100 billion and $200 billion, he had found himself under intense fire from his colleagues in the administration who claimed that this was a gross overestimation.

Consequently, Lawrence Lindsey was forced to resign.It is also imperative to recall that the Bush administration had claimed at the very outset that the Iraq war would finance itself out of Iraqi oil revenues, but Washington DC had instead ended up borrowing some $2 trillion to finance the two wars, the bulk of it from foreign lenders.

According to the Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government 2013 report, this accounted for roughly 20 per cent of the total amount added to the US national debt between 2001 and 2012.



<snip>

http://www.globalresearch.ca/afghanistan-and-iraq-americas-six-trillion-dollar-wars/5351229

[BelgianMadCow]

1. Yes. Not to mention the LIES that war was based on

and the IMPUNITY the criminals still have. Dick Cheney on 60 minutes looks like something out of an alternative reality to me.

[lostincalifornia]

2. Oh you mean the war that the media in this country told us had WMDs? Is it a wonder that they

do not want to publicize that since they screwed up in their shoddy half-assed reporting

[Fumesucker]

3. Hillary Clinton voted for the IWR

If she actually believed the Cheney regency and the M$M then she is far too naive to be president.

On the other hand it's possible her vote was just a cynical political move to maintain her "electability" by not opposing a popular war.

[lostincalifornia]

4. and other Democrats voted for it to. Some I suspect for political opportunity, for fear that it

would be used against them, others because they believed the lies from the administration. Colin Powell sitting before the U.N.

In fact, the American populous by a wide majority believed the bush administration. Most had never heard of PNAC, and we were coming out of 9/11.

That does not justify anything, however, if you are getting briefings by an intelligence agency, and you do not realize that the intelligence is setting you up, it is very plausible that a Senator or Representative could be led to believe something that was not true.

The reason most progressives were skeptical is because the U.N. contradicted what was coming out of our intelligence and the administration at the time.

Keep in mind that bush won two terms based on lies. They controlled the press coverage, and the press was too willing to accommodate.

[Martin Eden]

5. I will never forget the cost, or the LIES, or the Dems who voted for it.

That's why I will never support Hillary Clinton in a Democratic primary.

And Dick Cheney belongs in prison, not on 60 Minutes re-writing history.

[indepat]

6. It's o.k. for a Repuke president to piss away $2 trillion on a pre-emptive war of aggression 'cause

Repukes had fully intended to pay for its cost through cuts in social social security and Medicare benefits. See, it's so simple.

[Bandit]

7. I think the Bigger budget buster was the two tax cuts in 2001 and 2003

Our economy started sinking immediately after the first tax cut and they all blamed it on clinton's policies. After the second tax cut there was no way America could recover and then WAR WAR WAR all off the books.

[hfojvt]

8. sorry, but that plays into Republican lies

that we have a spending problem.

At $6 trillion, it is not the biggest budget buster. The 22 year cost of the Bush tax cuts, most of which are now PERMANENT is over $8 trillion.

Not to mention the "stimulus" of early 2008 or the tax cuts that were part of the stimulus of 2009 or the accursed payroll tax cuts.

The biggest budget buster is tax cuts, most of which go to the richest 20% of the population.

[Berlum]

9. "Smirk." - Chickehawk Republican War Profiteers, Inc. (R)