The Disaster in Iraq By the Numbers

OK, I'll try to make this brief.

As of today we've spent about $333 Billion on Bush's adventure in Iraq. To put that in perspective the Iraqi GDP (that's a measure of their entire economy!) is about $94 Billion when controlled for purchasing power parity (which would actually make their economy seem bigger than if not controlled for). So we've spent more than three times the entire Iraqi economy on this war.

We've spent most of that money on military actions and equipment. What has it done for Iraq's economy?

According to the CIA's world fact book entry on Iraq, the Iraqi economy is actually shrinking by 3% per year. At the same time, Iraq's inflation rate is a whopping 33% per year. All this while between 25% and 30% of the population is unemployed. And now a new, non-partisan scientific analysis of civilian deaths in Iraq conducted by the Department of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University (famous for research in both public health/medicine and international politics) estimates that 665,000 Iraqi civilians have died since we invaded. The study estimates that the death rate in Iraq has nearly trippled since our invasion. Of course American forces are not responsible for most of those deaths. But any rational person would look at this picture and acknowledge that it will be nearly impossible for any American government, and the Bush administration especially, to make the argument that Iraq is somehow better off since we invaded. Furthermore, from a purely financial perspective it is hard to see what the American tax payers are getting for their money.

This is a situation that is of Republican making. They are in majority in both houses in Congress. The President is Republican. Democrats have been systematically shut out of most decisions and when their votes were desired for political window dressing, they were flat out lied to in order to win their temporary support.

Vote Democratic in November!