The Iraq War & What Could Have Been
As the enormous costs in blood and money of the Iraq war come into ever sharper focus, it is worth pondering what the electoral landscape would have been like this winter were there not still 150,000 U.S. troops slogging away on a fool’s mission that has no end in sight.
One thing is certain: Even a modest infusion of the money diverted for the war into jobs and infrastructure improvement projects in blighted Ohio — say a couple hundred million bucks or so — might have made a difference and the entire nature of the campaign there, including the candidates in play as well as last night’s outcome, would have been rather different.
Beyond what Ohio has desperately needed but hasn’t gotten, there is a lot of “what if” numbers crunching going on these days.
As in what if the hundreds of billions of dollars wasted on a war that some great economic minds say could now top out at three trillion smackeroos were applied to make college educations more affordable, to put more patrols on the U.S.’s borders, and so on and so forth.
If I were John McCain, who has staked his credibility and his campaign on the Forever War, this whole scenario should be terrifying.
It remains and will continue to be the single biggest reason the Democratic nominee will be the prohibitive favorite as a war-weary America votes in November.
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23 Responses to “The Iraq War & What Could Have Been”
[...] The Moderate Voice – Domestic and international news analysis, irreverent comments, original reporti… wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThe Iraq War & What Could Have Been March 5th, 2008 by SHAUN MULLEN As the enormous costs in blood and money of the Iraq war come into ever sharper focus, it is worth pondering what the electoral landscape would have been like this winter had there not still be 150,000 U.S. troops slogging away on a fool’s mission that has no end in sight. One thing is certain: Even a modest infusion of the money diverted for the war into jobs and infrastructure improvement projects in blighted Ohio — say [...]
[...] The Moderate Voice – Domestic and international news analysis, irreverent comments, original reporti… wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThe Iraq War & What Could Have Been March 5th, 2008 by SHAUN MULLEN As the enormous costs in blood and money of the Iraq war come into ever sharper focus, it is worth pondering what the electoral landscape would have been like this winter had there not still be 150,000 U.S. troops slogging away on a fool’s mission that has no end in sight. One thing is certain: Even a modest infusion of the money diverted for the war into jobs and infrastructure improvement projects in blighted Ohio — say [...]
[...] The Moderate Voice – Domestic and international news analysis, irreverent comments, original reporti… wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThe Iraq War & What Could Have Been March 5th, 2008 by SHAUN MULLEN As the enormous costs in blood and money of the Iraq war come into ever sharper focus, it is worth pondering what the electoral landscape would have been like this winter had there not still be 150,000 U.S. troops slogging away on a fool’s mission that has no end in sight. One thing is certain: Even a modest infusion of the money diverted for the war into jobs and infrastructure improvement projects in blighted Ohio — say [...]
The more responsible alternative to spending all that money in Iraq would be not spending it at all. Considering how outrageously large our national debt is and how much tax revenue goes to paying just the interest each year, it would be a much smarter option to put every penny we would have save by avoiding the Iraq mess into paying down the debt.
Amanda is correct of course, but second best would be to apply the dough to domestic areas like higher education, infrastructure, the development of cheaper, more efficient hybrids, wind farms, the use of solar panels, rebuilding New Orleans,shoring up social security and medicare, insuring working class families, stem cell research, etc These types of programs are enormously popular among Democrats.
The worst choice is what we have done- driving up the deficit and becoming mired in a war with no end- one where longterm solutions elude us, but where we can keep the peace shortterm by maintaining a large force.
Do we need to be reminded of why the Soviets failed? A ten-year old
war in Afghanistan and the expense of keeping up with the US in arms races led to the collapse of their empire.
McCain, to his credit, at least originally opposed the tax cuts while we were spending up the wazoo, but has since recanted this heresy to appeal to the GOP base. I00 years in Iraq with possibly an even bigger military presence will only appeal to Bush's 30% ers.
So, I guess I agree with Sean. Sorry I forgot to put that in my comment!
“The more responsible alternative to spending all that money in Iraq would be not spending it at all.”
Absolutely — with perhaps redirection of some of the money to debt retirement, but of course there is no case for throwing good money after bad on bailouts and prop-ups of places that have themselves to blame for self-destructive, obsolete economic and political policies. What's being implied as an alternative to the war (object of demented views by the far Left, as is Bush, as we continue to see), is the equivalent of a vast welfare program and bailout for the Rust Belt, which makes no moral as well as economic sense at all.
“higher education, infrastructure, the development of cheaper, more efficient hybrids, wind farms, the use of solar panels, rebuilding New Orleans,shoring up social security and medicare, insuring working class families, stem cell research, etc “
Almost none of those should really be undertaken by the federal government and of course there are no miracles just waiting to happen if money were supplied in the areas of alternative energy or stem cell research.
“Do we need to be reminded of why the Soviets failed?”
Or the Democrats, whose policies have been rejected frequently by the public since 1980?
Make no mistake, the public is disappointed to disgusted with the Republicans, and some Democratic goals have their appeal (as the Pew report I provided a link to once or twice indicated). This is going to be a Democratic year and subsequent two years, at least. But don't fall into the trap of believing there is an enormous mandate for the full slate of traditional, long-term Democratic goals, much less the unrealistic (I am being far more kind here than I need be) view on the far left that past Democratic failures, and real solutions, involve going much farther than the Democrats have gone before [tm].
Good luck running the country for at least two years starting next January.
Is it just me or is this the same DLS that for months here has been lamenting the inevitable one party system we will be facing forever?
Davebo,
You are just you, and DLS is as contradictory as always
Davebo: You are confusing me (DLS) with Superdestroyer, often abbreviated “SD.” Perhaps it is because I'm convinced that this year will be a Democratic year. We're getting Clinton or Obama, I'm convinced of that. SD (Superdestroyer) is looking at the long term with demographics (growth of minorities in the US population, heavily beholden to the Democratic Party) while I see the GOP remaining as an opposition party eventually to gain some vitality as the cost of entitlements in the next 10-20 years reach unprecedented levels and we see a battle for “equilibrium” between the howls of the taxpayers and the howls of the beneficiaries facing cost controls and what that portends or at least threatens.
I'll leave everyone for now with another fact to make the lefties recoil: Any kind of redevelopment of the dead and dying Cyanide Nation-Rust Belt zones would be like what you see in places such as the suburban and exurban Virginian part of DC metro, or Atlanta, or (if we want a known home for liberals to be features) like Austin. In other words, SUV-filled suburban schlocky chain-and-big-box streets with Silicon Valley (and Dulles area) style office parks. It's not going to be any kind of wind-and-solar-powered-transit-based neighborhood granola-and-coop cluster stuff.
DLS,
Considering that Target; Bed, Bath, &Beyond; and Best Buy are opening this week in the middle of DC, it is hard to call the suburbs any more schlocky as any other place.
And suburban New Jersey had just as many suburban office parks as Northern Virginia.
DLS- The public may be rejecting the extremes of both sides. They don't want government catering to corporate power or to the religious right any more than they want increased entitlements or huge tax increases.
The pendulum is merely swinging back after a long period of Republican rule.
I'm not arguing that in 1980 the country wasn't ripe for a swing to the right- it was. The Obama Republicans mirror the Reagan Democrats. Probably neither party's policies work too well when they are left in power too long.
But I do think that both 1980 and 2008 are sea change elections.
DLS- By the way, the Democrats are also capable of miring us down in a never-ending war- Vietnam was started by a Democratic president. Korea was started by a Democratic president, and ended by Eisenhower, a Republican. Both of those wars could have gone on infinitum, as they, like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were in all probability, unwinnable.
I'm sorry I'm late to this. <a href=”Ihttp://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200803/road-rail-air-networks”>Inadequate infrastructure comes with enormous economic costs.
As it stands now, we've flushed billions and billions of dollars down the drain in fighting these wars. And our infrastructure is still inadequate. Which means we still have to spend a large amount of money to build the infrastructure we need, even though we are in debt.
Sorry about the screwed-up HTML in my previous comment. Maybe this will work.
SD, Whole Foods is also a suburban-scale place and there has long been a Whole Foods in downtown DC. I've been there a number of times. There's even a Web page for that store.
http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/stores/pstreet/
Also, I'm saying what's likely to develop (and I'm confident in my position on this) but I'm not against more neighborhood-style development. I used to live only a mile from a thriving urban neighborhood district, loved walking there and being there, go there all the time still (at least once a month from here in Iowa), and would love to live near there again — “INSTEAD OF WAR, INVEST IN PEOPLE” signs, Bush-wanted-for-war-crimes signs and all.
http://www.ucityloop.com/
“I do think that both 1980 and 2008 are sea change elections.”
We'll see. Logic argues that as our population ages we'll be more conservative, but we're also hooked on and dependent on entitlements, and often we see no alternative to interventionism as has been the case with health care (extending Medicare to everyone was radical fringist only a few years ago but is mainstream today). What remains to be seen is if it's a big change or just thumbs down on how things currently are, but then it is like 1994 and no serious change actually results after the elections — the new people get corrupted once more. I don't see a big left move even with public preference for the Dems currently, and there's no extreme right presence in Washington (despite what many in the media and in the leftist community would say). (In fact, dissatisfaction with the GOP in Washington includes dissatisfaction with excess spending and a dearth of discipline.)
Also, K, note that central city development is anomalous. Most central cities are dead, economically speaking. DC (with its federal-government “occupying army” that dwarfs our presence in Baghdad — HA!) is a 24/7 lively place. Few central cities are that way. It remains to be seen 10-20 years from now if many retirees choose a central city-based location and newly-developed and rejuvenating lifestyle. (If governments assume long-term care as a universal entitlement, it may be where government nursing homes are located, incidentally.)
DLS,
What keeps downtown DC going if having a large number of single 20 somethings. That demographic does not like the suburbs.
You should see the new Super Whole Foods in Fairfax. About five sit down restaurants are located inside. The place is huge. You should also look up Wegman's grocery. It is like a Whole Foods and a normal supermarket under the same roof.
DLS- Conservatives won't be able to win over retirees by talking about cutting benefits for Medicare and Social Security, which are our biggest entitlement programs. They would automatically lose the state of Florida. Since that state was pivotal to Bush's 2000 ahem “victory” cough cough, it was obvious that he had to ditch conservative dogma and pander to the older 60 crowd by promising the prescription drug plan. Now we are stuck with it.
I don't consider those programs to be giveaways. People work all their lives and pay payroll taxes to have a few golden years of relaxation at the end. They deserve peace of mind. Our longer lifespans and rocketing costs for housing, energy and healthcare have also complicated everything.
I would cut the prescription plan or at least try to get cheaper drugs from Canada. I would shore up the other two programs, because Medicare especially has become useless, as few want to treat the complicated problems of the elderly when the rates are constantly cut and their costs are rising.