I won't look at your numbers Tom. I know them by heart. The issue isn't numbers anyway when it comes to social programs because none of those expenses are arbitrary. You and I and every other citizen will pay those costs no matter what political system holds the reins in this country. The only difference is in what form the bill will come. We can provide people with retirement funds, medical assistance, education, etc. or we can put the money into prisons and police forces to protect us from the advancing hordes armed with pitchforks. Oh and don't forget the cost of the bulldozers we'd need fleets of for the mass burials.

However, military excursions are not necessary expenses. They're a choice unless someone is moving over your border with tanks. There are a lot of noted economists I'm hearing daily that are claiming the costs of the Iraq War to be much higher than the statistics you're claiming when the full picture is looked at. Let's see, who should I believe? You and the places you cite that have been wrong about everything in terms of our recent foreign and economic policy or people that I've been listening to that nailed the economic woes we're facing right now years ago and told us about the impossibility of creating a stable state in Iraq? Not a tough choice.

Art