So far, the United States has spent a grand total of approximately $139,744,240,000 on the war in Iraq, not counting indirect costs or human lives.

*blink*

That’s roughly $474 for every man, woman, and child in the United States. You know, I could kind of use that money right now.

Or, put another way, that is:

– Enough money to build 69 space stations, with sufficient money left over to double the size of the Space Shuttle fleet;
– Enough money to give full college scholarships to 3,493,606 college students;
– Enough money to multiply the Federally-funded programs on AIDS and cancer research by 46 times, with enough left over to double the amount of health insurance subsidies available to low-income citizens;
– Enough to multiply Federal law enforcement and anti-terrorism budgets by a factor of five, with enough left over to double the number of guaranteed student loans;
– Enough money to increase the budget for national parks and wildlife preserves by two hundred and sixteen times;
– Enough money to rebuild every single interstate and US highway in the entire country, with enough left over to pay the salaries of 305,690 new police officers (at salaries two percent higher than the national average);
– Enough money to give every single schoolteacher in the country a $22,000 a year raise;
– Enough money to multiply the total national budget for education by two times, with enough money left over to double the budget for the EPA and double the budget for the National Science Foundation and pay for another Space Shuttle and triple the senior citizen prescription drug benefit;
– Enough money to clean up every single Superfund environmental site, with enough left over to double the Veteran’s Administration fund and wire every public school and library to the Internet.

I wonder if the war on Iraq represents the best value for that money.