Todays number: One Trillion

On this memorial day, we stop to consider that huge, horrific number. That number is what the two wars have cost American's. Raw Story calls it sad, to me it's more than that. From the RS writeup:

The cost of the United States' wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have cost taxpayers more than one trillion dollars, a Massachusetts nonprofit said Sunday, marking a grim milestone on the eve of the Memorial Day holiday.

According to the group, the threshold was crossed Sunday at 10:06 am ET, based on Congressional appropriations for the wars. To date, the group notes, $747.3 billion has been appropriated for the U.S. war in Iraq and $299 billion for the war in Afghanistan.

The group, National Priorities Project, conveyed the size of US war spending by highlighting other things that could have been bought with the money. For example, for the price of America's two wars, the US could give $5,500 in Pell grants to all of America's 19 million college students for the next nine years. One trillion would also pay the entire healthcare bill for 294 million people, or 440 million children, the group says.

A billing pending in Congress will add another $37 billion to this year's spending.

In a press release posted Friday, the group gave a list of other considerations that could have been purchased for $1 trillion. Among them:

     What Can You Get For $1 Trillion?

    * Federal Funding For Higher Education -- $1 trillion would give the maximum Pell Grant award ($5,500) to all 19 million U.S. college and university students for the next 9 years.

    * 294,734,961 people with health care for one year, or

    * 21,598,789 public safety officers for one year, or

    * 17,149,392 music and arts teachers for one year, or

    * 7,779,092 affordable housing units, or

    * 440,762,472 children with health care for one year, or

    * 137,233,969 head start places for children for one year, or

    * 16,427,497 elementary school teachers for one year, or

    * 1,035,282,468 homes with renewable electricity for one year

It physically makes me ill...sick to my stomach, to think what we could of done with all that fucking money. 

And these...cough, costs.. are just the tip of the iceberg. The cost in human lives and those lives that have been shattered forever just boggle the mind.

This is what nightmares are made of folks... Enjoy your memorial day, if you can. Or watch the video I created a few years back about the human cost of the Iraq and now..the Afghanistan Wars.