Bell Curve The Law Talking Guy Raised by Republicans U.S. West
Well, he's kind of had it in for me ever since I accidentally ran over his dog. Actually, replace "accidentally" with "repeatedly," and replace "dog" with "son."

Friday, November 04, 2005

Molly Ivins

This is an interesting article. Ivins goes off on a left-wing rant about how we should spend more on education and less on the military, but some of her numbers are eye-opening:

Just for starters, is there anyone -- anyone -- who thinks we need more than 1,000 nuclear warheads in order to have a credible nuclear deterrent at this time? By cutting back to 1,000, we can save $13 billion right there.
$13,000,000,000 is a lot of money. If you stacked 13 billion dollar bills one on top of the other, you would get a stack 882 miles high, or about four times the distance from the earth to the moon. (Stupid numbers. See the comments.)

Maybe it is time for the fiscally responsible members of our government to suggest some things like this... but don't hold your breath.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

The moon is about 240,000 miles away (from Earth). I'm sure Bell Curve was suffering a mental hiccup just now.  

// posted by LTG

Dr. Strangelove said...

Funny... I read Bell Curve's post and did not process the numbers. Good catch, LTG.

Anonymous said...

Ah, dang it. That's what I get for doing poor research. It's still a lot of money. 

// posted by Bell Curve

Anonymous said...

I once read that American Airlines saved $40,000 in 1987 just by removing one olive from salads served in 1st class.

It only takes a few little things, you know. 

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

According to this Oxfam website , the United States spends over $70 Billion on agriculture subsidies!

Hell, if we stopped spending all that cash, we could buy a bunch of schools, retrain or pension off the farm workers who would lose their jobs, and still have money left over to invade a small country or two of Bush's choice. And we'd immediately help world poverty too! 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

Bell Curve. Don't feel bad. It's a blog, right? It would be nice to get the numbers right but no one is going to judge you too harshly. ;-) 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

I just want to know what $40,000 worth of olives looks like.  

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

LTG, I wish I could see it too. Think of the martinis that would make!

RBR, you need to blog on the fact that the US and the EU just blew a pretty good shot at cutting their respective Ag subsidities. We offered 60% cuts in ours. Damn French. I love 'em, but as their friend, I tell them that was stupid of them.
 

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

I've blogged about ag subsidies before and even drew fire from a friend of the Citizens in France. I'm planning a new entry about ag subsidies in general soon. 

// posted by Raised By Republicans