Stimulus Cost vs Iraq War: Stimulus Cost More than Iraq War

Mark Tapscott at the Washington Examiner quotes an American Thinker article by Randall Hoven. Obama's failed Stimulus spending cost more than the Iraq war. I was amazed at this for a couple of reasons - one being that I thought the Iraq war was the biggest expenditure known in the history of the modern world, but apparently not.

Stimulus Costs More than Iraq War

Hoven quotes elitists saying the Iraq War cost $3 trillion. The CBO tells Hoven the entire cost is $709 billion. I don't about you, but I feel much better now. I can think of several who are near and dear to me whom I will assault with these figures - gleefully, and often.

Here's a handy stat: the stimulus bill passed in Obama's first month in office costs 15% more than the entire Iraq War. Repeating, 15% MORE THAN THE ENTIRE IRAQ WAR.

* Obama's stimulus, passed in his first month in office, will cost more than the entire Iraq War -- more than $100 billion (15%) more.

* Just the first two years of Obama's stimulus cost more than the entire cost of the Iraq War under President Bush, or six years of that war.

* Iraq War spending accounted for just 3.2% of all federal spending while it lasted.

* Iraq War spending was not even one quarter of what we spent on Medicare in the same time frame.

* Iraq War spending was not even 15% of the total deficit spending in that time frame. The cumulative deficit, 2003-2010, would have been four-point-something trillion dollars with or without the Iraq War.

* The Iraq War accounts for less than 8% of the federal debt held by the public at the end of 2010 ($9.031 trillion).

* During Bush's Iraq years, 2003-2008, the federal government spent more on education that it did on the Iraq War. (State and local governments spent about ten times more.)

How many times can we repeat this between now and midnight November 1st? Read Randall Hoven's Iraq: The War That Bros Us -- Not, it's a handy piece to bookmark.

Others Talking about the Iraq War Democrat Lie:
Reaganite Republican - with a classic pic of the Edsel

posted by Maggie @ Maggie's Notebook

Pelosi Scrubs CBO Letter from Net: Paul Ryan Dems Abuse Confidentiality of CBO: CBO Score Not Official

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) revealed today that Nancy Pelosi received a letter from the CBO, which she failed to release, touting the CBO scoring of $940 billion - giddy that it is under $1 trillion, and failed to tell America that the CBO said the the estimate is not official because they have not yet factored-in the reconciliation bill - because it has not been made available for scoring. Pelosi is has seemingly scrubbed the CBO letter she received from the Internet. MSNBC and Human Events linked to it and both are coming up errors. No small coincidence. But you can see some of that CBO message to Pelosi below. Ryan also makes the point that Democrats have "abused the confidentiality of the CBO," and obviously she has lied again about health care legislation.

Rep. Ryan made this statement today:

The Congressional Budget Office has confirmed that there is currently no official cost estimate. Yet House Democrats are touting to the press -- and spinning for partisan gain -- numbers that have not been released and are impossible to confirm. 

Rep. James Clyburn stated he was "giddy" about these unsubstantiated numbers. This is the latest outrageous exploitation by the Majority -- in this case abusing the confidentiality of the nonpartisan Congressional budget Office -- to pass their massive health care overhaul at any cost.

Here is at least a portion of the CBO's private and special letter to Nancy from the MSNBC links above:

Although CBO completed a preliminary review of legislative language prior to its release, the agency has not thoroughly examined the reconciliation proposal to verify its consistency with the previous draft. This estimate is therefore preliminary, pending a review of the language of the reconciliation proposal, as well as further review and refinement of the budgetary projections.

Health Care Saturday Vote Unlikely: CBO Score Not In - Analysts Overwhelmed

If Democrats honor the 72-hour-promised-window to post their health care bill online (do we really believe they will do so, or are we just pretending?) there will be no Saturday health care vote because the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has not yet scored the monster, pushing a vote to Sunday, if the score arrives tomorrow (Thursday). See update below.

The Hill says analysts are overwhelmed and are working 100 hours a week "to be sure we have a score that's solid as a rock for procedural purposes and potentially litigation purposes...."

Update 3-18-10:
The CBO estimate arrived today, happily coming in at under the $1 trillion price tag, at $940 billion, with deficit savings of about $138 billion.

Hot Air has a must-read on this - go there (click the link below) to see the "Gross Cost of Coverage Provision:

Update (AP): Here’s the key table from CBO’s letter to Pelosi. Via Philip Klein, want to see what a shabby fraud these cost estimates are? Check out the line for “Gross Cost of Coverage Provisions”:...This is why they’re delaying the start of the program, of course. If it kicked in right away, the decade-long estimate would obviously be well into the trillions. So they simply stalled it for four years, incurring just $17 billion in costs — or 1.8 percent of the total 10-year estimate — through 2013 so that wavering Democrats could go back to their districts and tell baldfaced lies to their constituents about the pricetag. A perfect ending to this travesty.

Senator Tom Coburn is on FOXNews this minute saying this is all smoke and mirrors.

Linked by Memorandum - see more discussion of Breaking: CBO releases the actual report.